In the immortal words of 90's singer Alanis Morissette - who's biggest hit was famed for containing no ironic lyrics whatsoever - it is like rain on your wedding day.
Landlord Deejay Royall took over The Bush in Wigan 18 months ago and being a forward thinking sort spent thousands on renovating the boozer; turning it into a completely no smoking pub five months ahead of the ban. The idea, presumably, being to entice non-smoking punters into the pub early and keeping their custom while all the 1 July hoopla took hold.
Instead the idea became Royall's "black fly" in his chardonnay. He told the Wigan Evening Post: "Basically, we ran out of customers.
"People started to go to other pubs that hadn't introduced the smoking ban yet and then when it came in July they stopped coming in altogether."
As Alanis would wail it is exactly like "A no-smoking sign on your cigarette break," but at least Royall understands that life has a funny way of helping you out...
"I still think it's a good idea but one that people will have to get used to and in the short term it will spell disaster for many pubs," he told the paper, keeping his chin up.
"People are staying at home, buying cheap booze from the supermarkets and sitting with their friends smoking their heads off."
Who would've thought... it figures?
