The venue aims to be relaxed and not too student heavy
Owners of the Village Cat in Woolton Village, ltr Rich Midgley, Andy Scott and Chris Welsh(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
Black Cat Bar & Bottle Shop has opened its fourth venue in Liverpool. Village Cat has been in the works for more than a year, with the grand opening arriving today, Friday July 31, at the hands of three friends still just “trying to do our best”.
In July 2024, the venue’s former resident, Coast Café Bistro, took to Facebook to tell customers it was closing its doors after a “combination of higher costs and reduced income” took too much of a toll on the business. Just short of two years later, the building was acquired by the Black Cat team – Andy Scott, Chris Welsh and Rich Midgley.
Serving a wide range of craft beer and real ales, Black Cat started on Smithdown Road and expanded onto Rose Lane in Mossley Hill in 2024. Black Cat opened its third location in October on Parr Street in Liverpool city centre, taking over the premises from pizzeria and bar Crazy Pedro’s.
Announcing the Woolton Village opening on Instagram with a video, the team was seen removing letters from the Coast Café Bistro sign to spell “cat”. The venue is now open and promises to offer the same atmosphere and drinks guests have come to love with a relaxed feel.
Co-owner Chris Welsh told the ECHO: “We saw the space over a year ago but only got the keys about six months ago. The original plan was a quick spruce up and get open but it became a much bigger job. Every venue we open we learn new stuff and try to reiterate what we know and make it the best we can.
“Village Cat will have a similar vibe to Rose Lane – slower and not student heavy. It’s pretty crazy three lads from Liverpool are opening their fourth bar. Hopefully, everyone can see the hard work paying off because we’re just trying to do the best we can. We’re very excited to open and hope everyone enjoys it.”
When the ECHO spoke to the team behind Black Cat in 2023, co-owner Andy Scott and Rich Midgley explained how the business, previously known as Craft Taproom, started.
Andy said: “I lived around here for ages and ages. I wanted there to be somewhere that I would want to go for a pint. A friend of mine left his job as a manager of a pub. I’d pulled pints and he said ‘do you want to do something?’.
We found an old butcher’s and it was £500 a month and thought we’d give it a shot. We had no idea what we were doing, we just went in there with a hammer, started battering it and then Rich fixed the mess.
“I then started chatting with Kev (Kevin McArthur who owns the Handyman pub on Smithdown) after we opened Evil Eye and thought about bringing the place together.
“That’s why we started the (Smithdown Road) festival, trying to speak to the other places and make it more of a thing when everyone started working together. It’s gone well.”
