The bookshelves lining the walls of the lounge at the New Inn in Wilsden give it a cosy home-from-home feel.

But these books aren’t just here for cosmetic reasons. This is a library – one of a number of initiatives licensee Joanne Chappell and her family have come up with to draw in more customers.

Every Monday, the pub holds a ‘Knit and Natter’ session and a coffee morning, and every second Monday in the month there’s a mini market, with stallholders setting up around the pub car park selling fresh produce and crafts.

The market idea was something that Joanne’s second cousin, Christine, who helps to run the pub with the rest of the family, saw in a magazine. She read about a pub encouraging a fishmonger to sell his produce from the venue.

“I thought it was a good idea,” says Christine, who ran a golf club in Portugal for 23 years before returning to Britain.

The market stallholders include a fishmonger, a cheese seller, and a grocer from the village. Joanne and Christine say the market has been relatively successful and they hope to expand, although they are conscious not to replicate the produce being sold along Wilsden’s Main Street.

Joanne’s aim when she took over the New Inn in November 2008 was to make it part of the community. She is now looking into setting up a parcel delivery point at the pub, in a further bid to encourage villagers to use their local.

A former social worker, Joanne enjoys being part of the community, and says pubs have a social role at the heart of communities.

She admits it hasn’t been easy. Taking over a village pub as the economic crisis was deepening was a challenge in itself. In her first year the brewery and the Budget put up the cost of the beer. “I suppose we took over at totally the wrong time because it was when the crash happened, but we ploughed on regardless,” she says.

According to the British Beer And Pub Association, 39 pubs are closing weekly, yet research by CAMRA, the Campaign For Real Ale, found 84 per cent of people believe pubs are as essential to village life as a shop or post office.

Mick Moss, Yorkshire regional director for CAMRA, says the pub trade is a tough industry, but he believes the ‘stronger players’ will survive.

“You have to diversify. You cannot just sell beer any more. You have to be innovative,” he says.

The Telegraph & Argus recently reported that 16 pubs across the district face closing time after their management companies went into administration.

What is recognised is that people’s social habits have changed. The availability of cheap alcohol has led more people to drink and entertain at home, and consequently pubs have suffered. Some are struggling on while others, like the New Inn, are coming up with other ways to boost support from their communities.

In his role as licensing minister, Bradford South MP Gerry Sutcliffe is to set out proposals to allow pubs to be community-run after the Government gave local authorities the power to switch ownership of threatened community assets to local people.

“The New Inn is a fantastic example of a pub that is at the heart of the community,” he says. “Pubs play an important role in millions of people’s lives across Britain and are just as significant as the local post office, village hall or corner shop.

“The New Inn offers something for everyone, from craft clubs to book swaps, and has recognised the need to adapt to changing customer habits. The Government wants well-run, responsible pubs to flourish and is working on measures to specifically help community pubs.”

Lisa Noble, who runs the Duke of York in Thornton with her son Sam, says that while the idea for pubs to be community-run sounds like a good idea, she would like to see the Government relaxing the duty on beer to give pubs a fighting chance of survival.

Lisa wants the Government to make it easier for breweries, with incentives such as relaxing the duty on beer enabling them to pass on the benefits through reduced prices to customers.

“We just need that financial support at grass roots from the Government,” she says.