The Salt Cot

The Salt Cot is a pub operated by J D Wetherspoon plc, located at 7 Hamilton Street in Saltcoats, North Ayrshire, Scotland. It is one of the many individual, individually named pubs that make up the Wetherspoon estate across the United Kingdom, and it trades under the Wetherspoon brand while carrying a local name drawn from the history of its town. The pub's name refers to the salt cots — small kettles or pans in which seawater was boiled — that were used on the Saltcoats seashore for curing fish, an activity that gave the town its name and that is recalled in the Burgh of Saltcoats seal, which features a salt pan in its design. As a Wetherspoon pub, The Salt Cot offers the chain's standard proposition: a wide range of real ales, beers, wines, spirits and soft drinks, together with an extensive food menu served throughout the day, at prices positioned toward the value end of the UK pub market. The pub opens from 8:00am daily, closing at midnight Sunday to Thursday and at 1:00am on Friday and Saturday. Children under 18 are permitted on the premises only between 8:00am and 10:00pm. Facilities include Wi-Fi, TV screens, a licensed outside area (deck), baby-changing facilities and step-free access. Customers can order food and drinks to their table through the Wetherspoon app. The Salt Cot participates in the wider Wetherspoon programme of promotions and events, including the twice-yearly real-ale festivals — the autumn festival features a range of 30 real ales, including five from international brewers in countries such as China, Denmark, Singapore, Ukraine and the USA — as well as seasonal Christmas menus and cocktail ranges such as the spritz cocktail selection. Like other Wetherspoon pubs, it also displays local historical material; the pub's history page notes a print and text about Alfred Nobel and the ICI explosives factory at Ardeer, which began as a British Dynamite Company plant set up by Nobel in 1871. The Salt Cot is not a separately incorporated business but a trading pub within J D Wetherspoon plc, the UK-listed pub company founded by Tim Martin, whose first pub opened in 1979 in Muswell Hill, north London, and which was floated on the Stock Exchange in 1992. Its identity is therefore both local — rooted in the maritime and industrial heritage of Saltcoats — and corporate, sharing the operating model, supply chain, branding and promotional calendar of the Wetherspoon group.

The Salt Cot is a pub in Saltcoats, North Ayrshire, Scotland, operated by J D Wetherspoon plc. Its name and identity are tied to the history of the town in which it stands. Saltcoats originated as a small community living in huts on the seashore, earning a living by fishing or by boiling seawater in small kettles or pans — the salt 'cots' — mainly for curing fish. These early origins are recalled in the Burgh of Saltcoats seal, which features a salt pan in its design. The pub therefore takes its name directly from this local maritime and salt-making heritage. The pub is part of the Wetherspoon estate, a chain whose history began in 1979, when the first Wetherspoon pub — purchased from an entrepreneur who had converted it from a bookmaker's — opened in Colney Hatch Lane, Muswell Hill, north London, on 9 December. For its first month it was called Martin's Free House, but it was renamed Wetherspoons early in 1980. In the early years the company's pubs were all located in north London, with the head office above The Dog in Archway. Wetherspoon hosted its first real-ale festival in 1990, lasting four days and featuring six beers; today each Wetherspoon pub takes part in the twice-yearly beer festivals, offering up to 50 beers each, 10 of them from overseas. In 1991 the company opened The Tally Ho in North Finchley, London, with a dedicated non-smoking bar upstairs, one of several pioneering initiatives it carried out before the smoking ban of July 2007. That same year it launched its CBS scheme (cleanliness, beer and service), began publishing Wetherspoon News, and opened Hamilton Hall at Liverpool Street station, its first pub in central London and at a train station. In 1992 Wetherspoon opened its first airport pubs, at Heathrow Airport's Terminal 4, and was floated on the Stock Exchange as J D Wetherspoon plc, with shares issued at £1.60. Within this national framework, The Salt Cot functions as one of the group's individually named local pubs. Its interior interpretation of local history follows the Wetherspoon practice of displaying informative material about the area: the pub's history page includes a print and text about Alfred Nobel, noting that the ICI explosives factory at Ardeer started as a British Dynamite Company plant set up by Nobel in 1871, and that by the time Nobel died in 1896 the Ardeer works was the world's largest exporter of explosives. The text also recounts that the explosive capacity of nitro-glycerine was discovered in 1846 by the Italian chemist Ascanio Sobrero, and that Nobel's contribution was the discovery that nitro-glycerine could be stabilised by mixing it with diatomite, a siliceous earth found naturally in parts of Scotland, after which the explosive could be fired with a detonator. As a modern Wetherspoon pub, The Salt Cot operates from 8:00am daily, closing at midnight Sunday to Thursday and at 1:00am on Friday and Saturday, with children under 18 allowed on the premises only between 8:00am and 10:00pm. It offers Wi-Fi, TV screens, a licensed outside deck, baby-changing facilities and step-free access, and supports ordering to the table via the Wetherspoon app. It takes part in group-wide promotions such as the autumn beer festival — a 12-day event running from Wednesday 7 to Sunday 18 October, offering 30 real ales including five from international brewers in China, Denmark, Singapore, Ukraine and the USA, the first time brewers from Singapore and Ukraine had been involved — as well as the Christmas menu available from Thursday 12 November until Thursday 31 December (excluding Christmas Day) and the spritz cocktail range of nine classic and fruity recipes.

• 1992

  Wetherspoon opens its first airport pubs at Heathrow Airport Terminal 4 and is floated on the Stock Exchange as J D Wetherspoon plc, with shares issued at £1.60.

• 1991

  The Tally Ho opens in North Finchley, London, with a dedicated non-smoking bar upstairs; the CBS scheme and Wetherspoon News are launched; Hamilton Hall opens at Liverpool Street station.

• 1990

  Wetherspoon's pubs host their first real-ale festival, lasting four days and featuring six beers.

• 1980

  The pub is renamed Wetherspoons early in the year.

• 1979

  First Wetherspoon pub opens in Colney Hatch Lane, Muswell Hill, north London, on 9 December; initially called Martin's Free House.

Value-focused community pub within the J D Wetherspoon national chain, trading under a locally inspired name.

• Real ale

• Beer

• Wine

• Spirits

• Soft drinks

• Pub food

• Christmas menu

• Spritz cocktails

1. 1The Salt Cot - J D Wetherspoonjdwetherspoon.com
2. 2History - J D Wetherspoonjdwetherspoon.com
3. 3The Salt Cot - J D Wetherspoon (pub history)jdwetherspoon.com
4. 4About us - J D Wetherspoonjdwetherspoon.com
5. 5The Salt Cot - Wikidatawikidata.org