Savills kicks off 2024 with controversial property listing
Estate agency is offering pub and accommodation for sale after establishment closed following police investigation and brewery boycott.
Savills has kicked off 2024 with a controversial property listing, it has been revealed.
The estate agency is marketing a now defunct pub in Essex that last year hit the headlines when police raided the establishment after complaints about its bar top collection of 15 golly dolls.
The White Hart Inn in Grays (main picture), south Essex is being marketed by Savills as a freehold 2,881 sq ft pub with accommodation. Offers are being invited in excess of £575,000.
The pub is no longer open after its co-leaseholder Benice Ryley threw in the towel last year, telling local media she’d “had enough” after two major brewers refused to supply her pub with beer.
A long investigation by police into the golly dolls produced evidence that was passed to the Crown Prosecution Service, but it later said this did not pass the threshold for a prosecution.
Golly dolls
Golly dolls are controversial because they are believed to be offensive to people of colour and were dropped by Robinson’s jams as a trademark for its products in 2001.
The pub was also later vandalised and the Campaign for Real Ale removed the pub from the organisation’s listings and requested that a ‘Pub of the Year’ award was removed from the premises.
Situated near Tilbury Docks, Savills property description for the Grade II listed building says it “comprises a two storey detached building with a multi-pitched tiled roof and brick elevations.
“There is a single storey outbuilding in the garden that has been converted into two letting rooms”.
The pub has a beer garden, parking for 12 cars and a cavernous ground floor trading area including a large pool table.
I think its disgusting that they were forced out of business for a collection of dolls that were a part of history, pity people are so narrow minded and politically correct. For them to loose their awards as well for being successful at what they do, is despicable. The breweries should have supported them instead of crushing them. It’s a lovely building and I hope they get a good price for it and it continues as a business. Good Luck.