Alan Healy: Are Cork's best-located pubs now facing existential threat?

The pressures that once seemed confined to rural pubs are now landing at the door of established suburban and city venues

The ordinary, suburban, food-serving community pub continues to carry every cost that is loaded on it.  Picture: iStock

The news this week of Cork's Silver Key entering receivership adds further fuel to the fire of the country's struggling pub trade.

The trend has been clear for some time now, but the refrain in recent years has been that the pubs facing the biggest threat were the wet houses in rural towns and villages, without the passing traffic and food to keep the businesses going.