The Ouseburn Leisure group has bought The Central from Camerons

The Central has had a chequered past. When I first visited, the exterior of the pub was flaky pink with a tree growing out of the roof and the interior was not much better.

In about 2009 it closed and Camerons threw a fortune at it. They cleaned it up and restored it to its former glory, brought in a landlord who knew the locals and how to look after good regional brews and were onto a winner.

Late last year the landlord announced he was off to pastures new once Camerons had secured a new licensee….. then, you know, the world stopped because of COVID.

In the last few days the Centrals social media presence has sprung to life and they have just announced that the Ouseburn Leisure group will be taking over the pub and running it as a free house (you can read the post here).

The Ouseburn Leisure group were unknown to me, but after a bit of googling I found out that they currently run the pretty good The Waiting Room in Durham station.

It’s good to see the pub changing hands in these incredibly uncertain times and of course, we wish them all the best… unless the proposed spruce up includes painting the outside pink again and the flea-bitten rottweilers return.