Pubs with great outdoor spaces have a real edge, especially when they offer something for the whole family. One of the most effective, and family-friendly, investments is a well-designed pub playground. Adding safe, engaging outdoor play equipment to your pub garden not only appeals to families with young children, but also encourages longer stays, increased spend, and repeat visits.
In this guide, we’ll explore the benefits of pub playgrounds, the types of equipment available, safety considerations, and how Active Garden can help you create the perfect play space for your venue.
Why Install a Playground at Your Pub?
1. Attract More Families
Parents are more likely to choose a pub with a playground, knowing their children will be entertained. A well-designed beer garden playground transforms your venue into a family-friendly destination, especially during weekends and school holidays.
2. Increase Dwell Time and Customer Spend
When children are happily playing, parents can relax and enjoy their meal or drinks for longer. This often translates to increased orders and a better customer experience overall.
3. Stand Out from the Competition
Adding an outdoor play area is an excellent way to differentiate your venue from others in the area. A pub with a playground is more likely to be recommended and shared on social media.
What Kind of Playground Equipment is Suitable for Pubs?
At Active Garden, we specialise in supplying and installing commercial-grade outdoor play equipment that’s ideal for pub gardens, beer gardens, and other hospitality venues. Our playground solutions are built to deliver maximum fun while ensuring long-lasting performance in high-traffic environments.
All our pub playground equipment is built for heavy, repeated use and designed to withstand the demands of outdoor, public environments. Many products come with steel ground anchors, pressure-treated timber, and galvanised fittings to ensure long-term durability. Plus, everything we supply meets or exceeds EN1176 safety standards, making it suitable for commercial installation in public settings such as pubs, schools, and parks.
We understand that pubs need outdoor equipment that is safe, robust, weather-resistant, and appealing to a wide age range—and our carefully selected range is designed to meet those needs:
Wooden Climbing Frames
Our commercial wooden climbing frames are a top choice for pubs looking to create an exciting and durable outdoor play space. We offer a wide range of options to suit different age groups, spaces, and budgets, including:
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Active Climbing Frames & Play Towers – Designed and built in-house, our modular climbing towers can be fully customised—from platform heights and layouts to climbing features and slides. Made from premium timber and installed by our expert team, they offer unbeatable value, durability, and a bespoke play experience tailored to your pub garden.
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Hy-Land Climbing Frames – These pre-designed commercial towers provide solid play value and meet EU safety standards. While suitable for tighter budgets, they come with fixed layouts and don’t include installation as part of the price, making them less flexible than our custom-built Active range.
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Panelled and Themed Climbing Frames – Add visual appeal and storytelling potential to your playground with colourful, themed towers and panel-based designs.
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All Out Play Playhouses – Beautifully crafted wooden playhouses and castles that encourage creative, open-ended play while complementing natural pub garden settings.
All our climbing frames are built from high-quality timber and commercial-grade materials to ensure long-lasting performance and weather resistance. They’re also designed to blend seamlessly with pub gardens, helping you create a welcoming space that children love—and parents appreciate.
Swings and Slides
A classic and cost-effective option, our standalone swing sets and slides can be added to any beer garden play area. Available in various sizes and materials, they’re suitable for toddlers through to older children.
Toddler Towers and Early Years Equipment
Designed for younger children, our toddler towers and Early Years play units focus on imaginative and sensory play, with lower platforms and safety-first features. These units are perfect for creating an inclusive, family-friendly space.
Trim Trails and Clamber Stacks
For a more adventurous setup, adventure trim trails and clamber stacks offer physical challenges that help build balance, coordination, and confidence. They’re a fantastic way to create an obstacle course-style layout that encourages repeat visits.
Other Options to Enhance Your Pub Playground
Add extra play value and comfort with freestanding play units, timber items like stepping logs and crawl tunnels, sandpits, fun spring rockers, and outdoor shelters or gazebos. These flexible features are ideal for smaller spaces and help create a welcoming, family-friendly environment.
Safety Surfaces for Pub Playgrounds:
In addition to supplying robust, commercial-grade equipment, we also provide a full range of safety surfacing solutions that reduce the risk of injury from slips, trips, and falls—particularly from climbing frames, swings, and elevated platforms.
We ensure that every safe surface we supply and install complies with EN1177 standards for safety surfacing, giving pub owners complete peace of mind that their outdoor play area meets the required guidelines for public use. All our surfacing options are designed to meet or exceed critical fall height (CFH) standards, ensuring they provide the necessary cushioning to minimise the risk of serious injury in the event of a fall. They’re also non-slip, permeable, and suitable for year-round use, making them ideal for busy pub beer gardens.
At Active Garden, our team can help you select the most suitable surfacing option based on your space, equipment, and budget—whether you’re upgrading an existing play area or building a new one from scratch. Popular safety surfaces include:
Rubber Grass Mats (Safagrass)
A cost-effective and low-maintenance solution, these interlocking mats blend discreetly into grassed areas and allow natural grass to grow through. Ideal for pubs that want to preserve a natural look while offering impact protection. Suitable for flat or gently sloping surfaces.
Rubber Chippings / Bark / Mulch
Eco-friendly and fire-retardant, rubber chippings are made from recycled materials and offer excellent cushioning with only a shallow installation depth required. They’re a practical, low-maintenance alternative to traditional bark, making them ideal for busy pub playgrounds where safety and cost-efficiency are key.
Bonded Rubber Mulch
Designed to look like bark but made from durable, recycled rubber, bonded mulch offers excellent impact absorption and is perfect for rustic pub garden settings. It’s porous, low maintenance, and remains in place—unlike loose bark or woodchip.
Wet Pour Surfacing
A premium option, wet pour provides a smooth, seamless finish in a range of colours and designs. It’s highly durable, meets a variety of critical fall height requirements, and is ideal for areas with high foot traffic or more complex layouts.
Artificial Grass with Shock Pad Underlay
For pubs that want a clean, soft, and all-weather surface, artificial grass is a great choice. When paired with a shock pad underlay, it offers enhanced fall protection and a visually appealing finish that complements landscaped gardens.
Rubber Tiles
Rubber safety tiles provide high shock absorption and excellent slip resistance, making them a reliable choice for outdoor pub play areas. Their robust construction withstands heavy use and all-weather conditions, helping maintain a safe, level surface year-round.
Installation Services Across the UK
At Active Garden, we provide professional playground installation services throughout most of the UK mainland, including England, Wales, and parts of Scotland. Our experienced installation team handles everything from ground preparation and surfacing to assembling and securing the play equipment, ensuring each playground meets all relevant health and safety regulations.
Whether you’re installing a compact toddler play zone or a large-scale climbing adventure, we deliver a hassle-free service that gets your pub playground up and running quickly and safely.
Custom Designs and Expert Advice
No two pub gardens are the same, which is why we offer bespoke playground design services tailored to your available space, customer base, and budget. Whether you have a tight courtyard area or a large outdoor beer garden, we can help you create a fun, functional play space that complements your venue’s aesthetic and appeals to your family customers.
Our friendly, knowledgeable team will guide you through every step—from equipment selection and layout planning to surfacing advice and safety compliance—ensuring you make the most of your investment.
Examples of Our Work
We’ve helped numerous pubs, hotels, holiday parks, and other hospitality venues across the UK transform their outdoor spaces with safe, high-quality play areas. Check out our Case Studies or browse our Gallery to see real-life examples of pub playground installations, complete with photos and details of the equipment used. Please visit our Instagram or Facebook pages for pictures of our most recent projects.
Invest in a Pub Playground from Active Garden
Investing in a pub playground is a smart move that delivers long-term value. From increased customer satisfaction to stronger family appeal, an outdoor play area can transform your beer garden into a buzzing, family-friendly destination. Whether you’re upgrading your beer garden or starting from scratch, Active Garden can help you design a fun, practical, and safe play area tailored to your venue.
Ready to create your pub playground?
Contact Active Garden today for expert advice, a tailored quote, and a no-obligation consultation.
