Jeremy Clarkson has never been shy about taking on new challenges, but even he admits that running a pub is tougher than it looks. Exactly a year has passed since he opened The Farmer’s Dog—his vision of the perfect British pub—in the Cotswolds, designed not just to serve food and drink, but to give farmers a place to gather, share problems, and lift each other’s spirits.
The latest series of Clarkson’s Farm has followed the Diddly Squat farmer’s bumpy road to opening the pub, which proudly serves produce sourced entirely from British farms. The menu changes with the seasons, but Clarkson insists one thing never will: “It will always be absolutely f***ing delicious.” Inside, guests will find a butcher, bottle shop, bar, and of course the famous Diddly Squat Farm Shop.
A Harder Task Than Farming
For all the charm, Clarkson admits the first year has been brutal. “Honestly, it was much, much harder [than I expected],” he said. “When you walk into a pub, you ask for a pint, you get a pint—it doesn’t look complicated. But behind the scenes, it’s regulation, food safety, staffing, finding chefs, finding waitresses… it’s endless.”
Then came the added headache of buying a 14th-century building with no gas, poor electricity, and barely any water. “If you run a sink, you’re out of water. And if you’re dealing with more than three people a day, which we are, it completely does your head in.”
Trying to open during the August Bank Holiday—at the same time as harvest—nearly broke him. “I’d spend all day at the pub firefighting hundreds of problems, then get in the tractor and cart grain through the night. I was working twenty, twenty-four hours straight. It actually messed my heart up—it was silly, really. Running a pub is more stressful than farming.”
A Place for Farmers
Despite the stress, Clarkson is determined to keep the pub alive for one reason: farmers. “Farming can be very isolating. You’re on your own, which is why there’s so much unhappiness in farming. I wanted somewhere farmers could go. If it’s raining on a Tuesday afternoon and they can’t work, they could come, have a pint, and talk to people who understand.”
He recalls one bleak winter when rain had hammered the fields for months. “Farmers were desperate. Nothing could be planted. I went to the pub with a few others and Kaleb. By sharing the problem over a pint, we were actually laughing about it. That gallows humour—it lifts you. For an hour or two, you forget your troubles. That’s the whole point of a pub.”
The Pub as the Hub
Clarkson believes the role of the pub in British life—especially rural life—cannot be overstated. “In a lot of villages, there’s no longer a policeman, no local shop, no vicar, no doctor you can actually see. If you lose the pub too, what is a village? Just houses. The pub is the hub.”
Still, he wishes regulation and taxes on pubs were lighter, given their importance. “People overuse the word ‘community’ these days, but there definitely isn’t one without a hub—and that hub is the pub.”
