Record Cafe, North Parade, reopens tomorrow after lockdown

The Record Cafe, North Parade, will reopen its doors at 11am tomorrow with a series of changes as it adapts to the social distance guidelines.

Owner Keith Wildman decided to wait until six weeks after pubs were allowed to reopen by the Government to make his venue as safe as possible for punters.

He says people can expect a number of changes to the layout and set-up at the bar, including table service and payment by card only. 

Other changes include staff greeting each customer as they enter the bar, taking down their details for the NHS's Track and Trace scheme and people using the hand sanitising station provided.

Reopening Saturday 15th, here’s the very important small print to read and digest:
•Table service
•Card only
•Track and trace
•One household / support bubble inside (as per current local guidelines 13/8)
Record… https://t.co/ylHAUdvKt1

— The Record Café (@TheRecordCafe) August 13, 2020

A couple of its tables have also been removed and Mr Wildman says his venue has benefitted from a decrease in the two-metre social distancing guideline.

The venue will be open at 11am, seven days a week, but will close at 9pm on weekdays and 10pm at weekends.

Mr Wildman concedes the lockdown period has been tough, but is back and raring to go and welcome back customers to the venue, often a pitstop on Bradford City home matchdays in the past.

He said: "We are doing our best in trying times.

"It very much feels like a restart. It feels like the right time to reopen. We decided not to reopen last month as we were erring on the side of caution.

I wanted to leave it until I could be sure we could do things properly

"We needed to do it to a standard people expect from us. A standard we can be proud of too.

"We will offer a warm, welcoming atmosphere.

"We will take the reopening a day at a time. Things can change quickly, we will see how it goes.

"Our job is to work within the rules we have been given.

Keith Wildman, Record Cafe owner, is ready to welcome back customers

"We wanted to wait to get people used to how it all works now. We wanted to see how it was working in Bradford, at other venues. The situation for lockdown was changing each day.

"My priority is to make people safe; staff and customers. They need to feel safe. When it's a smaller venue, it's about the minimum number of people you can have in at any one time, not so much the maximum.

"You don't want people to feel like they're visiting a clinic, or a hospital. We don't want a clinical atmosphere.

"People will understand if things have changed a bit. We need to adapt accordingly. We have lost a couple of tables.

"Whatever changes we make, it's going to be tricky.

"We will have table service. I really like it. We are still doing takeaway bottles and cans and selling records."

The Record Café was revealed as Bradford CAMRA's (Campaign For Real Ale) 'Pub of the Year' for 2020 a week before lockdown in March.

It is the second year in a row the unique bar has been named as the best in the city. The bar also won Bradford CAMRA's 'Pub of the Year' back in 2017, securing a runner-up spot the year after, as well as earning the title of 'Pub of the Season' in autumn 2015.