All hands on deck as pub opens in shipping container

He serves pints in his London shipping container, where customers can exchange football stickers for pints.

But for this enterprising Cork man, owning his own sports bar is a dream come true.

Carrigaline native Sebastian O’Driscoll moved to London after graduating from college in 2008. Despite working for charities as a programme manager, he harboured other ambitions.

“I always wanted to open a bar,” he said, and the would-be publican spotted his opportunity in a novel community for start-up businesses.

Artworks is a project on Elephant Road in central London that rents refurbished shipping containers to new retailers, restaurants and start-ups. Over 50 of these containers have been refurbished and rented out to a community of new businesses, including a Mauritian tearoom, a Caribbean take away, stores and even a library.

“It’s ideal for a start-up as the economies mean it won’t absolutely break you to have a go. I wanted to open a pub in the area where you could go to watch sports, a place that wasn’t a dodgy bar or part of a chain,” O’Driscoll explained.

The appropriately-named Six Yard Box opened in January, a traditionally quiet time but the kick-off of the Six Nations saw an upturn in business.

The small pub has been packed since and regularly hosts events such as Fifa video game tournaments, Fr Ted bingo and screenings of all major televised sports events.

Having roped in some friends to put in the hard work required to turn the empty container into a bar, O’Driscoll saw potential in the unit’s low ceiling.

“We had collected World Cup stickers over the summer and thought ‘why not cover the ceiling with them?’ In reality the stickers we had barely covered half of it.”

And with that, pounds sterling were replaced with Panini stickers.

“For the first few weeks people would bring in their football cards and stickers and we’d give them a few pints for them. It became a sort of currency and was great for getting stuff for the ceiling. Soon word spread around about the bar,” he said.

The Artworks community is a temporary project, but O’Driscoll has ambitions that stretch beyond the flat-pack shopping centre’s five- year life span: “I want to open a place with five-a-side pitches and a bar. A sort of social sports place. So many people in their 20s and 30s move to London and don’t know anyone here. I want to create a social hub where people can meet, go for a kick around and a pint after.”

Until then his customers will have to content themselves with a kick around on the tabletop football within the cosy environs of the Six Yard Box.

Joe Leogue