Five years ago, I was talking to Rob and Amie McKay to welcome them as new publicans of the Soar Bridge Inn. Sadly, they have now decided that it is time to leave. They were doing so well and then Covid came along. The Soar Bridge became a focus of help, community spirit and sanity for all the village in those two crazy years. Now we are ‘learning to live with Covid’ and things have become a whole lot harder for many in the hospitality industry. Rob explained the two main problems: lack of staff for the pub and lack of enthusiasm for pubbing by the public. “People found other things to do during the lockdowns and they just haven’t come back. So, we have decided to come out of the hospitality industry altogether, after 25 years. We both want to find employment that will enable us to spend time as a family. Our daughter Isla (who is six) has missed out on so much; it’s time to give her our focus.”

The Soar Bridge was outstanding in the activities they set up to support people during the pandemic. I know because I used a lot of them. They managed to stay open for six days a week throughout. They provided takeaway food to order including their standard menu as well as their
themed evenings – fish night, pie night etc. Rob did all the cooking while Amie was on the door, packing the food and getting it to the customers with all safety precautions in place. “We’ve never worked so hard. Eventually we had to get some of the staff back out of furlough because we couldn’t cope on our own”. They added variety by getting two pop-ups in and those arrangements are still in place: the Greek Taverna comes every six weeks on a Wednesday while the Burgerologist comes every two weeks on a Tuesday.

As if all this weren’t enough, they started lunchtime food deliveries for pensioners. People phoned in their orders and Amie delivered to the door. It became a social lifeline as well as a practical help. Amie loved it! So did the customers. So did Isla, who enjoyed helping in between doing her home schooling.

On VE Day the Soar Bridge provided 85 free lunches! They invited people to nominate local service personnel and their families to receive a free twocourse meal. They had to draft in five extra members of staff and their cars, all working for nothing. It was a tough but very rewarding day.

In early summer 2020, when people had got thoroughly used to their daily walk or cycle ride, Rob made the pub car park available (free) on several Saturdays for Martin Bujdosa to bring B Buddies Cycles along to help people get their old bikes into working order.

A bit later they had the idea of making the car park available for a village ‘market’. That continues each Monday from 8.30am – 3.00pm. People had started doing their shopping locally and the stalls were increasing the range of products on sale in Barrow. We have a fruit and veg stall, bread, cakes and pies, a fish stall and the Refill Shop.

So, one way and another, Barrow is really going to miss Amie and Rob as publicans of the Soar Bridge Inn and we thank them for all they have given to the village in their five years. They, in turn, will miss pub life and they want to thank their loyal supporters and customers. Rob also wants to put on record their gratitude to the brewery Everards who supported them through and beyond Covid: “Without them we would never have survived”. Barrow Voice wishes them luck in their next journey.

Judith Rodgers

Don’t miss the opportunity to see Keith Chaplin’s display of photographs of Barrow in days-gone-by on the lounge walls of the Soar Bridge Inn.

They are particularly interesting as each has a good explanatory text beneath. There’s a wide range of photographs from the old railway station to the gravel industry with a train crash thrown in! At present anyone visiting the pub can see them but when the pub changes hands in September who knows? Visit soon and enjoy them now.

Gaynor Barton