UPDATE 1-Pubs to come up smelling of roses after smoking ban

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By Jonathan Cable

LONDON, June 26 (Reuters) - Once the air has cleared after the English smoking ban next week, what will the average local pub smell of? How about crisp cotton, apples or roses?

Those are just some of the "ambient scents" being offered by Ambius, a unit of services group Rentokil (RTO.L: Quote, Profile, Research), to help cover up smells such as stale beer and old buildings -- not to mention less hygienically conscious drinkers -- that were previously masked by clouds of cigarette smoke in pubs across England.

"Most people think with all this smoke going away everything is going to be fine and dandy," Jeff Mariola, managing director of Ambius, told Reuters. "The reality is, when you remove the odour, you are left with what you couldn't smell ... it's going to hit everyone right in the face."

England is due to go smoke-free on July 1, following Wales, which outlawed the habit in enclosed public places in April and Scotland. Ireland and other European countries have also banned smoking indoors, while some parts of Canada and a host of U.S. states have had strict controls on public smoking for years.

The chief executive of Oceana and Liquid nightclubs owner Luminar (LMR.L: Quote, Profile, Research), Stephen Thomas, said one problem of the smoking ban was that people would now smell their fellow sweaty clubbers.

Thomas said the firm had decided to pump in smells such as rose petal through the air conditioning systems.

"We are using rose at the moment but we think we can find something better and we are testing other ones to see which works best," he told reporters at the time of the group's results in May.