AFTER two years searching for the right pub, David and Shirley Cuss took just two minutes to agree that they had found their perfect hostelry in The Crown, Broad Hinton.

"We're really excited about our new business venture," said Shirley. "We have been looking for a pub to run for two years, but we knew almost immediately that The Crown was right for us. We fell in love with it straight away."

The Crown at Broad Hinton is the Cuss's first pub and more than 100 family, friends and customers turned out to celebrate on Saturday.

"We have moved up from West Sussex, but I grew up in Swindon and trained at The Blunsdon House Hotel so it's really wonderful to come back home," he said.

George Arkell of brewers Arkells said: "Matching landlords to the right pub is almost an art. But when we met David and Shirley we knew that they were right. David's a fantastic chef and Shirley is bubbling with ideas."

For Shirley, her new role as a landlady is completely different from her previous career - as a pensions review adviser, calculating mis-sold pensions for one of the UK's largest insurance and pension companies.

"I've left one type of pension behind, but I hope that with our new business we'll start building up our own personal pension scheme straight away," she said.