August 2026. Sheffield.
Walking back from that Bass-less Loxley Sports Bar through Hillsborough, I once again fail to walk past the door of the Spoons.
This is definitely the year of Wetherspoons, and not just because I didn’t lose my 50p tokens this year. For a start, they’re my default loo stop on long urban walks now that McDonalds seem to have plumbing issues.
Their coffee has gone up a notch, the Freedom Breakfast is an all-time bargain, and that non-alcoholic Erdinger with sticky Korean chicken is a genuinely great lunch.
I come for the loo, and stay for the beer.
The Rawson Spring avoids GBG attention, but quietly serves up as impressive a cask selection as you’d want; most folks would be happy with that at a CAMRA beer festival.
The nice young man takes my token, tops up my pint, and charges me £2.05 for a cool, rich pint of Burning Sky Aurora (VERY GOOD) that will cost you nearly three (3) times that in its home town of Lewes.
Those tokens are the big subject of debate on CAMRA Discourse at the moment, folk moaning about erratic coupon validity in the early part of the week when the real ales are heavily discounted anyway.
For every person that argues cask is sold too cheap (and they mean £4 rather than the sub-£2 Spoons pints) there’s someone who’ll remind us that Tim Martin is catering for folk who otherwise wouldn’t go out for a pint at all.
Note that drippage. A bloke next to me came over to the next table and asked if he could have his beer mat. Do Wetherspoons have beer mats hidden behind the bar ?
retiredmartin 
To address the biggest issue first, in my experience pretty much all Spoons have dripmats somewhere behind the bar; the more enlightened put a couple of piles on the counter.
I’ve never had a problem using vouchers early in the week, I’ve never been told that the price has already been reduced so vouchers are ineligible.
The only issue used to be when Ruddles was less than £2, so that the voucher would have brought the price below £1.50 (I hasten to add that I’ve never stooped to Ruddles, but I have heard chuntering in Stoke Spoons).
And, to end on a high, you’re bang on about the free from sausage freedom breakfast, £3.50 in Sandbach.
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I have absolutely no qualms in using the *ahem* Camra discount vouchers. On 10/60 for my membership year so far (expire Feb 27) and fully intend to use them all. And no, I’m not part of the ‘Cheap Beer Club’ considering I’ve paid about £30 to get £30 off beer throughout the year.
The chairman of Oxford Camra mentioned on Discourse that The Royal Blenheim accept them, so good to know I can use them to sink some Titanics there.
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