Secrets of Britain’s biggest Wetherspoons. It can fit 1,400 people and has 100 beers on tap. Now HARRY WALLOP exposes exactly what goes on… and why they constantly need to change the carpet

Nearly 75 years ago, George Orwell wrote that the pub was part of ‘something distinctive and recognisable in English civilization’, a place where all types could gather.

Is that still the case? Orwell was writing as Nazi bombs fell on Britain and he felt it was important to celebrate all that made this country special.

There are now 45,000 pubs in Britain – down from nearly 61,000 at the start of this century. Not only are Brits drinking less alcohol than a generation ago, pubs are more expensive to run, with the Government increasing both the minimum wage and employers’ national insurance contributions.

To gauge this British institution’s health, I visited the Royal Victoria Pavilion, Ramsgate, the largest of all the 795 pubs operated by JD Wetherspoon, the company set up by Sir Tim Martin. This ’Spoons, can fit in a maximum of 1,400 customers over its two floors and has an astonishing 100 separate beer and wine taps.

So how can such a vast venue flourish when other pubs are closing? To find out, I spent an entire Friday at the Royal Victoria, from 8am when it opened to closing time at 1am on Saturday.

8am

Ayse Massouras, 48, a beautician, is first through the door. She didn’t finish karaoke until 3am and admits she’s possibly still drunk from last night. She’s come in for breakfast – an egg and sausage muffin with latte (£3.77).

‘It was lovely, it did the trick. I just love Wetherspoons, particularly this one,’ she says. ‘I come here all the time. Look at the view!’ The beach is outside the picture windows. On a clear day you can see across the Channel to France.

The manager, Chris Whitbourn, 41, who has run the pub since it opened in the summer of 2017, says the sandy feet of customers means they need to replace its carpet every five years, rather than the once-a-decade norm.

9.05am

The Royal Victoria starts serving alcohol at 9am. Mark Best, 68, a retired sign maker and regular, is reading the newspaper, sipping a pint of Poretti lager (£4.49), which is 4.8 per cent ABV. He says that after a couple of these, he’ll move on to a Black Dragon cider at 7.2 per cent strength. ‘I’m escaping the grandkids,’ he jokes.

‘I’ll have six or seven pints,’ he says. An NHS doctor might point out that’s 50 per cent more than the recommended weekly allowance – 14 units – in one morning. I ask him how he’d describe his relationship to alcohol. ‘It loves me, and I love it,’ he laughs. And, to be fair, three pints later he’s tackling quite a difficult crossword, with no sign of being the worse for wear.

10.45am

Wetherspoon has a curious reputation. Many see it as downmarket, but the company has also restored lots of fabulous old buildings. The Royal Victoria is a grade II-listed Edwardian seaside pavilion, with a substantial first-floor terrace. Nearly half of the 353 tables are outside overlooking the beach.

Sandra Ford, 81, and her husband David, 83 are breakfasting with friends Sheila, 75, and Colin Pattison, 85, from Liverpool. They are on the sunny terrace. ‘A lot of Wetherspoons are dumps,’ says Colin, who’s ordered the eggs Benedict. ‘But this is unique. This has such a lovely ambience.’

11.30am

My first pint of the day: a Ruddles, for the incredibly cheap price of £1.79; the average UK pint costs £4.83 according to the Office for National Statistics. Rumours used to persist that Wetherspoon could only sell beer this cheaply because it bought it as it was about to go off. This isn’t true; because it sells so many pints, it negotiates a lower price from the brewer.

Colin Wilson, 82, a retired publican, drinking a Plum Porter, agrees the real ale is reliably decent quality. ‘I’ve never had a bad pint in a Wetherspoons,’ he says.

12.15pm

The terrace is starting to fill. Seven 18-year-olds, from the town’s Chatham & Clarendon Grammar School, are celebrating having finished their final A-level (religion and philosophy) this morning.

Why ’Spoons? ‘Because it’s cheap!’ three of them chorus. ‘These peanuts are 78p,’ says Chris with a sense of wonder.

Cody, who hopes to study philosophy and sociology at Sussex University, says he sometimes came to the Royal Victoria to revise for his exams. ‘It’s got lots of charging points and there were free coffee refills.’ The best selling drink at Wetherspoon is the £1.71 coffee.

When Noah orders a second Leffe beer (£4.95), the waiter who delivers it to his table asks for ID to check he is 18 years old.

1.30pm

The sun is blazing, diners are tucking into lunch. This pub makes lots more money from food than drink, unlike a typical Wetherspoon where food is 38 per cent of turnover. Over a recent weekend, celebrating the 85th anniversary of the Dunkirk evacuation, the pub served an astonishing 8,327 meals, including 423 fish and chip orders – Wetherspoon is technically the country’s largest chain of fish and chip shops.

I order a small one (£9.92), which is good – crispy batter, firm cod. It comes with a pint of beer if I pay £11.68.

2.15pm

Lots of families have come to the seaside for the weekend, including Fern Bushnell, 31, with her four-month-old son, her parents and partner Simon Griffiths , from Kettering. ‘This Wetherspoon is my spiritual home,’ Simon says. He’s only half joking.

‘I genuinely feel at peace here – the views, the fantastic terrace, we can sit here and order beers on the app.

‘It means we don’t have to stop chatting to go to the bar.’

3pm

Inside is quiet, but there is a bustle on the terrace. Eddie Burdett, 55, is sunbathing – ‘I feel like I’m on holiday here’ – and is asked to put his T-shirt back on; Drew Welch, 38, and Heidi Howard, 39, have come to celebrate that they’ve just posted their intention to get married at the town hall. A group of six former colleagues, most in their early 60s, have been meeting up for nearly 30 years, ever since they were laid off from an insurance company in the 1990s.

‘Back in the day, we would have gone to a nightclub and checked out the girls,’ laughs Huw, 60, drinking a pint of Doom Bar.

Now, it’s a sedate pub crawl around Ramsgate. They are on their second pub, and fourth pint.

5.30pm

The terrace is rammed with a mixture of weekenders from London starting a big night out, families treating their children to post-school burgers and colleagues enjoying after-work drinks.

The only two people I see in a suit all day are James King, 25, and Alex Porter, 24, who I correctly guess are estate agents. Alex admits he once came on a date to the Royal Victoria. Was the date a success? ‘Well…’ he looks a bit sheepish, before laughing ‘She came back to mine.’ Who knew the Ramsgate Wetherspoons could inspire such romance?

6.40pm

Young bar staff weave through the throngs of drinkers. A cheer goes up when a tray of drinks is dropped.

Sheree Mummery is celebrating her 70th birthday with pitchers of cocktails – two for £16 – with each pitcher containing four shots of alcohol including an alarming looking Purple Rain made of Blue Curacao, Corky’s cherry schnapps and lemonade. ‘It’s all full of ice, really’, Sheree says.

7.55pm

Nine colleagues from the nearby FujiFilm printer ink factory are tucking into a dizzying array of drinks including pitchers of Mango Monster Mash and Woo Woo cocktails. Wayne Griffiths, 59, and Emma Porter, 30, discuss how they won’t stay here all night. ‘We want to boogie,’ she says. Wetherspoons bans music at nearly all its venues and many of the customers say that means ‘you start the evening at ’Spoons, you never end it here.’

Wayne reminisces how the Royal Victoria used to be the Fifth Avenue nightclub in the 1990s, before lying derelict for a decade. ‘I used to love it here back then.’

As a lifelong Ramsgate resident, he says he’s pleased it is now a Wetherspoons. ‘They’ve done a brilliant job here.’ A few tables along, a young drinker has vomited all over the terrace and the staff are out with a mop.

8.15pm

Earlier, Chris, the manager, insisted I should try the sticky Korean-fried chicken bowl with coconut-flavoured rice. So I do, for my dinner. The chicken is not bad, if a little light on spicing, but the accompanying pint of Poretti – one of 100s served today – is bland fizz.

9.30pm

The pub is still full of families. Kids are variously on their scooters inside, on iPads watching cartoons or playing card game Uno.

Another group of A-level students, from the private St Lawrence College, are ordering espresso martinis and pints of Guinness. Freddie Durrant (head boy), is watching a Lions rugby game on his phone. ‘There are no TVs in ’Spoons,’ he says apologetically. Amber Bamford (head girl) says: ‘This is the go-to place. Everyone comes here.’ She’d earlier had a Hugo Spritz, one of 2025’s trendy drinks – gin, elderflower and prosecco. ‘Classy,’ I suggest. ‘That’s because we’re classy people,’ she replies.

10.25pm

The pub is quieter and the terrace is mostly deserted; children are asked to leave at 10pm.

Miles Quinn, 78, a former school caretaker, wearing a loud Hawaiian shirt, is drinking a pint of Ruddles. He comes in every night between 9 and 11pm and the staff know him.

I am flagging, and one punter, Chris, suggests I try a SoCoLocobomb – a shot glass of Southern Comfort whiskey sunk into a glass of Monster Mango Loco energy drink. It’s £5.18 and one of the most disgusting things I have consumed. Ten minutes later, however, my heart is racing and I’m noticeably more awake.

11.05pm

Charlie, 39, a postman from north London, is celebrating Danny’s 41st birthday. Danny is, ‘medically retired’. Charlie explains: ‘His heart only works at 20 per cent’. They’ve been in here since 4.30pm. They are slurring as they order black sambuca shots.

Danny leans in to ask me if I’ve ‘got any gear’, by which he means drugs. I tell him no and suggest that even if I did, it might not be very good for his heart. He laughs.

11.47pm

Four security staff have been patrolling the pub all evening. A middle-aged woman, who’d earlier tried to have an argument with me about Tommy Robinson (she is a fan), is exchanging aggressive words with her mother. A security guard encourages her to leave.

11.50pm

Two well-dressed French friends, Lucie Dugan, 28, who works in wine, and Anna Fahy, 30, a cosmetics executive, are down from London and drinking Broadwood’s Folly, English sparkling wine. Lucie says they picked Ramsgate after they asked ChatGPT to suggest a seaside resort less than two hours from London with a sandy beach.

Lucie asks me how well the Kentish locals would take to her sunbathing topless. I suggest many Brits are quite uptight. ‘It’s normal in France – it’s about freedom,’ she says. And does Wetherspoon represent freedom? ‘I love this place, I love the carpet, the space, the old-looking furniture. Everybody has come here – families and kids. We love it.’ She’s not drunk, just giddy at ending up in Britain’s biggest ’Spoons.

12.30am

Staff are wiping down tables and putting out breakfast menus. Not many customers remain, some who do are rowdy. On the terrace, a group of former school friends, now aged 19, are dancing to Mr Brightside by The Killers, which is drifting across from The Waterfront pub across the road. They had vowed to me earlier they were going to go to the Dolphin nightclub in Broadstairs.

Why are you still here? ‘Because it’s cheap, and nowhere is cheap in 2025,’ says Freya Svenson who’s just quit her job from TK Maxx.

1.03am

Callum Shrimpton, 22, an NHS support worker, is with his friend Lewis. He’s drunk three pitchers of Sex On The Beach, two Corky’s shots and a skittlebomb (Cointreau and Monster Energy). About 20 units of alcohol in ‘just 40 minutes’ he says with a sense of pride. He insists he rarely drinks; this is an exception because it’s his birthday next week.

My verdict

It has been a very long day. But I’ve managed to enjoy three square meals, 3 pints, a cocktail and a whisky & soda nightcap for a mere £41.44 and I’ve met an astonishing array of people, nearly all of whom were happy to end up in the Royal Victoria.

As Drew Welch told me earlier: ‘I know the burgers will be half decent; I know the pints will be cheap. Is it the best? No. But you know what you’re going to get. That’s what a lot of people want. I’m not surprised it’s successful.’