Dutch brewing giant Heineken plans to reopen 62 bars in Britain and invest €45 million in refurbishing over 600 pubs across the country.

Heineken’s Star Pubs & Bars chain currently operates 2,400 outlets across the UK but that was 2,700 before the coronavirus pandemic. Most of its 2,400 pubs are currently leased out to small firms and entrepreneurs.

“Now is clearly a significant moment in terms of the resilience of pubs coming back and showing how they can still work very well for consumers up and down the country,” Lawson Mountstevens, Star Pubs’ managing director, told the Financial Times.

He said he envisioned Heineken investing at this level for the next four years or so and that the investment is Heineken’s “massive vote of confidence in the longevity of pubs in the UK”.