Discovering Industry Bar and Kitchen was a case of wandering past while charity shopping for niche Jason Statham DVDs on Gloucester Road and spotting the dartboard through the window. Since then I have visited several times as a stopover when I have 30 minutes to an hour to waste between work and pub quiz/meeting friends on Gloucester Road. For this purpose it’s an ideal spot. As more of a sports bar it’s quiet in the early evening, before matches kick off, meaning the dartboard is almost always free. If not, there is a back-up dartboard with a slightly worse set-up in the main room of the pub. There is only one cask beer option: Tribute. However, in all my visits so far it’s been well kept and goes down very nicely. For a few years in my undergrad it was my beer of choice in the Highbury Vaults, another pub that won’t feature otherwise in this series due to its lack of dartboard.

The main dartboard set-up is in the function room adjacent to the bar. So far I haven’t been on a visit where it’s occupied, but as mentioned there is the back-up board if required. The board is an immaculate Winmau Blade 6, well lit, with a solid rustic looking wooden surround preventing damage to the wall, and providing mounting for a chalkboard for scoring. There is also a table next to the oche which has a sign saying “reserved for the darts”. However, if a big match was on the large telly in the room I doubt this would be adhered to.

The oche itself is a mat with a plethora of throwing distances. The standard steel tip dart distance of 237cm is accompanied by 244cm for soft tip. The shortest distance, 229cm, is from log-end darts, an earlier but still played form of the game. The 260cm line I’m unsure about, although I found a Facebook post suggesting the oche distance varied between leagues in the 60s/70s. Perhaps a relic from a less codified darts era. Boak and Bailey recently discussed this more generally in a post about the origins of darts in pubs. The oche in Industry is perhaps its weakest point. With the profusion of throwing lines pressed against an angled fire escape door, which would be off-putting for throwers who prefer the right hand side of the line.

As mentioned, there is a second darts set-up. It is in a slightly worse spot, with the back of the oche somewhat in the way of a walkway, and without a window onto Gloucester Road for people watching. However, it is still a better set-up than some of the boards already reviewed in this series, and certainly some to come. The board is from a Paddy Power promotional/charity effort from this year’s darts World Championship. Make a donation of at least £2 to their JustGiving page for prostate cancer, present the receipt email at participating betting stores and go home with a board. Although I view online gambling companies as wolves preying on the desperate and bribing lawmakers to allow them to continue to do so, I can’t knock Industry for taking a free board of them. Gambling is a problem in the UK that will take far more than not having a branded dartboard to solve. The number of gambling website adverts I receive since getting into the darts has shocked me, but I assume is seen as normal if you are into e.g. premier league football.

All in all the set-ups in Industry are very good. The two regular barmen are excellent, serving pints with a smile and a friendly chat, and helping people that come in looking for a particular football match to find the channel and get it on one of the many available screens. It is my darting spot of preference on Gloucester Road. When I get round to reviewing the Prince of Wales/ the Cider Press / Bishops Tavern etc… the scoring will reflect this.