Restaurant closure ‘sad day’ for Coast

A COMPETITIVE restaurant environment has been blamed for another well-known eatery closing its doors.

Ribs and Rumps Marina Mirage will serve its last rack of ribs on August 8 after more than a decade of business, and is the sixth Ribs and Rumps store to close in two years.

National operations manager Matt Wood said the increase in number and direction of restaurants made it too hard to stay afloat.

“Unfortunately trading in what is an extremely tough restaurant environment has now outweighed the commercial benefits of staying open,” he said.

“There has been a big change in the Gold Coast market. I’ve seen the shift in the dining scene and toward the southern end of the Gold Coast, something a lot of restaurateurs are seeing.

“I couldn’t put my finger on it to be honest so I would prefer not to speculate.

“People’s choices are people’s choices and we can all speculate, but primarily all I can do is thank our loyal customers and it will be a sad day when we stop serving ribs on the Gold Coast.”

This is the sixth Ribs and Rumps closure in recent years, following Manly, Parramatta (NSW), Preston (Victoria), Gladstone and Mackay.

Mr Wood would not comment on the financial position of the other Ribs and Rumps locations at Townsville, Rockhampton, two in Brisbane and two in Sydney.

Ribs and Rumps is owned by Minor DKL Group, which also owns The Coffee Club and Coffee Hit franchises. He urged loyal locals to continue dining at the Marina Mirage location until the closure and even make the trip up to Brisbane for their ribs fix.

“We’ve had a great following on the Gold Coast for some time and I would like to thank those loyal customers and our team dishing out those ribs,” he said.

“We’ve got multiple other locations in different regions and we hope to see anyone coming up to Brisbane.”

I’VE SEEN THE SHIFT IN THE DINING SCENE AND TOWARD THE SOUTHERN END OF THE GOLD COAST MATT WOOD, RIBS AND RUMPS