Meet the Sicilian who runs a London pub

“It was not a direct flight," quips Stancanelli when explaining how he ended up moving from his native Messina to the UK.

"My first stop was in Finland. You can imagine the reason why a Sicilian would move to freezing cold Helsinki in November when it was pitch black 24/7 was not the weather! After that I wondered why I would come back home, so I moved to London because I had a few very good friends here," he says.

His introduction to "the pub universe" came around two decades ago when he and a business partner began providing the food for a pub in Hoxton, East London run by pub operator and brewer Fuller's.

Stancanelli's stint in the kitchen certainly proved a hit with the neighbours.

"Once I made my grandma’s meatball recipe, and ever since I had to have them ready for every service – someone local even named their wifi network ‘meatballs’, it was quite an institution at the time!"

“I was working in the kitchen," he explains, "but I was still able to observe the procedures: how to pour beer, how to serve customers, how to clean the lines in the cellar, all the basics of bar management."

Moving to The City Pride

13 years ago Stancanelli was presented with the opportunity to put what he had learnt to good use when he was offered the chance take on The City Pride as a tenanted pub by Fuller's.

“I went from having 50% of a kitchen business attached to a pub to having a whole pub, so you can imagine how much pressure I felt in those first years."

It would seem apt that Stancanelli should have taken on a pub in Clerkenwell, as this particular part of Central London is home to the British capital's own 'Little Italy', complete with delis, restaurants and the impressive St Peter's Italian Catholic Church.

Despite the sizeable Italian population across London, The City Pride is not a hotspot for them, something which Stancanelli attributes to the differences between Italian dining and drinking habits and those of the Brits.

Stancanelli's arrival at The City Pride

"I have Italian customers, but we Italians don’t have pizza in pubs. The moment they come here and try the pizza, they’re hooked, but it takes a long time to bring them in," he says. "And to be honest, I like having English customers – Italian customers have a pizza and a pint and stay at the table for a long time, but English customers have several pints and eventually have a pizza to ‘dry up’ a bit. So, from a business point of view, I’m happy to have more English guests!"

Stancanelli notes that him being a Sicilian has added "a little bit of mystery" among some of the pub's punters due to the island's association with organised crime.

"People think 'he must be in the Mafia'," he remarks, sharing an anecdote about how one time he was called to the bar while cleaning some kitchen knives, leading one customer, upon seeing Stancanelli brandishing the blades, to exclaim "I knew it!"

In reality, he is friendlier and more hospitable than many a London publican.

As for whether he thinks a classic British pub could succeed in his home town, he remarks: "A British pub in Messina would have to offer British food, which no one in Messina will order."

Food and drink

Because The City Pride is fully tied, the drinks selection is determined by what Fuller's is offering, with Peroni being the best-selling beer. Regarding wine, there are a couple of nods to Stancanelli's Sicilian roots with a Nero d'Avola and a Grillo on the list, as well as those stalwarts of the English wine market, Pinot Grigio and Prosecco.

Although it was dishes such as his famous meatballs which put Stancanelli on Fuller's' radar, The City Pride's food offering is, aside from some bar snacks, entirely pizza. Asked whether he would like to put some more unusual, regional dishes on the menu in the future, he says: "I would love to, but it would mean that I would either have to go back into the kitchen and employ someone else for the bar, or employ another chef. I have to be careful about who I let cook my grandma’s recipes!"

"It would also slow down service," he adds, "and with pizza there’s no wastage and the margins are very good. With fish and meat, there’s wastage – it’s a matter of financial survival, but of course I would love to serve dishes that haven’t been served before in London."

Economic reality

"Financial survival" has become a motto for the hospitality sector across the UK. While pubs in London remain popular – just go into the centre on a Thursday evening for a pint and see for yourself – the economic challenges of operating these businesses have grown and grown in recent years, as is evidenced by the numbers.

"13 years ago, when I took over this pub, an average week to break even was £5,500-6,000, now we’re looking at £11,000,” he declares. "Minimum wage when I opened here was £6.30, now it’s £12.20, so it has doubled. Bills too – it was £800 a month on electricity, now it’s £1,500, and it’s not because I’m using more power. The last rent renewal, when we re-opened after Covid, went up by £30,000, from £60,000 to £90,000."

“The takings might be the same, but the costs are not," he says.

The City Pride is certainly not alone in this regard. The pub sector has been hammered in recent years by staff shortages, soaring energy bills, the rising cost of labour due to the National Insurance increase, the list goes on. Many in the hospitality industry are braced for the situation to worsen ahead of the UK Government's Autumn Budget tomorrow (26 November).

“I’m silently waiting to see what they decide, there’s nothing I can do – I have to anticipate a struggle, but I have to wait,” says Stancanelli, expressing a sentiment that many business owners in the UK can doubtless relate to.

As with many pubs in this part of London, where much of the footfall comes from office workers, The City Pride is closed at weekends. However, Stancanelli has been able to find a lifeline to help keep the business going: renting the pub out for private events.

"After the Covid-19 Pandemic we had to figure out other ways to make ends meet. Different promoters have heard about this place thanks to word of mouth, and its banging sound system. I also have a 24 hour licence, which helps. No one lives round here, though with the power of the sound system I have to shut the windows otherwise the police will come! This investment has helped the pub a lot: we can make money on a day when we’re usually closed, which gives me some optimism," he shares.