![\"Paul](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/0_Pauls-Bar-L22-on-St-Johns-Road-pictured-Paul-and-Liam-Roach-Photo-by-Colin-Lane.jpg\")
Paul Roach, who owns Paul’s Bar on St John’s Road, Waterloo, with his son Liam, who runs the bar(Image: Colin Lane\/Liverpool Echo)<\/p>\nPaul Roach now describes himself as ‘the happiest I’ve ever been’<\/p>\n
11:15, 14 Jun 2025Updated 11:15, 14 Jun 2025<\/p>\n
Paul Roach, who owns Paul’s Bar on St John’s Road, Waterloo, with his son Liam, who runs the bar(Image: Colin Lane\/Liverpool Echo)<\/p>\n
Paul Roach describes himself as “the happiest I’ve ever been”. It’s 4pm on a warm, sunny Friday afternoon and he’s sat in his bar – Paul’s Bar in Waterloo<\/a> – with a glass of his favourite beer in his hand.<\/p>\n It sounds like la dulce vida, but life wasn’t always this simple for the dad, who’s originally from West Derby<\/a>. In a previous chapter, the 54-year-old was an RAF serviceman before becoming an electrician, eventually becoming stuck in a job he “hated”. It would take a trip to Spain before his fortunes changed.<\/p>\n Speaking to the ECHO<\/a>, Paul explained: “I was working as a spark, looking after some student properties, but I hated it. I went on holiday and, coming back, I said, \u2018I can\u2019t do this job anymore\u2019.”<\/p>\n Paul wanted to open a bar with the same “living room atmosphere” seen in taverns across Spain, where he’d just visited. He continued: “I\u2019d been in Madrid and knew that was the vibe I wanted: people playing cards with a glass of wine, no televisions and a more mature drinking culture where you\u2019re not just drinking to get smashed.”<\/p>\n When he returned to Liverpool, Paul quit his job and opened up Spanish-style bars in the Baltic Triangle and then Southport<\/a>. Then, two and a half years ago, he sold his Southport bar and established Paul’s Bar on St John’s Road, Waterloo<\/a>. He said: \u201cWe sold the business there and this room popped up on Rightmove.”<\/p>\n St John’s Road is a street known for its independent shops and businesses, but known less so for bars and pubs – unlike Waterloo’s other high street, South Road, which has over a dozen. According to Paul, some locals were originally apprehensive about the prospect of a new drinking venue opening on St John’s Road, but he “won them over”. He said: \u201cI got a bit of a kickback and there were a few eyebrows.<\/p>\n “I think what they thought we were going to do was similar to South Road, but that\u2019s not us. We\u2019re not a loud bar and we\u2019re not a late bar. We\u2019re open until 10pm because the neighbours don\u2019t want to hear us slamming doors at 11pm. Also, if you\u2019re open dead late, and people are getting really loud, the atmosphere gets stale.<\/p>\n “We won the locals over very quickly and they now drink here. I\u2019ve got one pair of customers who, every time they come in, tell me, \u2018You were so brave\u2019. But I wasn\u2019t, I was na\u00efve because I didn\u2019t know the area.”<\/p>\n Paul added: “It\u2019s been absolutely brilliant. I\u2019ve just made so many friends.”<\/p>\n Keeping with its Spanish influence, Paul’s Bar serves a selection of Iberian-inspired snacks, as well as an impressive array of wines and beer, Alhambra being their best-seller. Paul said: “My passion is wine. I love wine and have done so for many years. So does my partner Julia. Her dad, being half Spanish, swore by a glass of wine a day and a black coffee a day.<\/p>\n “We try to have beers not everyone else has got, but quality is number one. We\u2019ve had Alhambra lager since day one. It\u2019s almost 60% of our sales and I will never change it. It is the best. Customers come in purely because we sell Alhambra.<\/p>\n “We\u2019ve got a local option with Love Lane.”<\/p>\n Paul runs the bar with his partner Julia and his son Liam, who’s in there most days serving customers. Paul said: “This is the fourth bar I\u2019ve had and this is, by lightyears, the happiest I\u2019ve ever been.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paul Roach now describes himself as ‘the happiest I’ve ever been’ 11:15, 14 Jun 2025Updated 11:15, 14 Jun…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":183507,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8815],"tags":[748,393,4884,179,8922,15650,16,15,14145],"class_list":{"0":"post-183506","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-liverpool","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-liverpool","12":"tag-liverpool-bars","13":"tag-liverpool-pubs","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-waterloo"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114681230540013544","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Paul](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/1749896591_87_0_Pauls-Bar-L22-on-St-Johns-Road-pictured-Paul-and-Liam-Roach-Photo-by-Colin-Lane.jpg\")
Paul and Liam Roach(Image: Colin Lane\/Liverpool Echo)<\/p>\n