RESTAURANT CLOSURE CLEARANCE (Pizza/Pasta)

THE AUCTION OUTLINE AND BACKGROUND.

In the days before the Christmas break 2017 the lawyer for a struggling 250+ seat modern pizza/pasta family restaurant contacted us to suggest resolution options including to refer them to an insolvency accountant as a voluntary liquidation seemed inevitable.

We made the appropriate introduction and on behalf of the proposed liquidator we prepared – during the traditional festive season break – a detailed inventory of the cooking/refrigeration equipment and the accompanying furniture plus utensils.

During this process we identified a significant quantity of packaged and opened perishables and other stock. To avoid these becoming health issues we consigned some to the skip bins and for others, we arranged private treaty sales to catering  business contacts that we already had.

As is usual in these cases, we created a library of photographs of most assets that were listed in the Appraisal and Report document. This also included several indications of overall realisation potential onsite and if the assets had to be relocated.

Because the restaurant was located on an upper level of a very busy major shopping centre particularly between 8am and 10pm every day, the centre management was unable to authorise us to hold an auction itsitu.

To overcome this we engaged a team of specialist catering equipment extraction contractors – including plumbers and electricians – to work after hours and transport to an alternative location for auction.

The assets were then prepared for cataloguing and auction. At this new location it was actually going to be more convenient for buyers because they could collect their purchases during business hours and it was at ground level with good truck access for larger items!

After suitable promotional activities in print media and online, the bidding public and trade buyers saw that the assets, which were less than 18 months old, were very suitable for their use and they bid most enthusiastically.

The auction and private treaty sales, probably netted what we initially estimated the gross to be!

In fairness, the lighting was pretty bad at inventory time and many good assets were somewhat invisible until transportation time!