$100m jewel in Oscars’ ‘Crowne’
THE hotel with the Gold Coast’s only revolving restaurant has spun into the hands of a group which hangs its hat on its passion to entertain and thrill every guest.
The hotel is the 32-year-old Crowne Plaza, midway between Surfers Paradise and Broadbeach, a property on which the developer-first owner spilled rather than thrilled – it had to swallow an $85m loss.
The ‘Crowne’ has just moved into the ownership of the NSW-based Oscars Hotel Group in a deal mooted to be worth $100m.
Oscars, started by brothers Bill and Mario Gravanis in the 1980s, has kept IHG Hotels and Resorts in place as the Crowne Plaza manager under what is termed a ‘renegotiated’ franchise agreement.
Whether the agreement requires the hotel to ‘thrill’ guests remains to be seen.
The new Crowne Plaza owner does talk about enhancing the guest experience – and, after all, major customers holidaymakers and tourists come to the Gold Coast for an ‘experience’.
Oscars describes itself as a fun, creative and dynamic group and its 30-plus assets include 30 or so pubs, bars and hotels, all but two in NSW.
The ‘fun’ angle can be seen in The Frisky Flamingo, an American-style late-night sports lounge at Woollongong.
There’s also ‘fun’ on the harbour at Sydney for anyone prepared to pay $2500 or more an hour to hire the group’s superyacht, the 105ft Oscar II.
The hospitality group is the fourth owner of the Crowne Plaza, which started as the TraveLodge when it was completed in 1991 and at one point wore Parkroyal branding. The hotel was built at a cost of $120m by Japan’s Sun group, part of an education business called Sundai.
Sun also developed the Lakelands golf course and later sold at a $60m-plus loss.
The hotel made headlines when it opened in 1991 because of its restaurant, which enabled diners to savour 360-degree views of the city as the hotel’s top-floor slowly revolved.
Sun retreated to Japan in the late 90s, selling the hotel to the former owner of Singapore’s Cockpit Hotel, the late Teo Lay Swee, for $35m.
A new building, the adjoining Gold tower, was completed by Sun in 1997, strata-titled by the Sway family, and sold off in 2005.
The Singaporean and Malaysian investors who have sold to Oscars paid $51.575m for the hotel and an adjoining
Beach Pde property in 2015. Oscars has paid $71.6m for the two properties and, apparently, $25m or more for the business, plant and chattels.
Its ‘spend’ has given it a 24storey hotel and 2000 sqm of adjoining development land approved for a 45-storey wave-shaped building with more than 200 apartments.
Oscars is believed to be weighing up its options for the land.
Its buy also includes four food and beverage venues, 11 conference and event rooms, tennis court and pool.
Oscars doesn’t get the management rights to the Gold tower – they were sold by the Singaporeans to The Oaks group in late 2019.
The money from that exercise was put toward a refurbishment of the Crowne Plaza’s 270 rooms and suites.
Oscars has indicated it plans further ‘cosmetic’ work down the line and a ‘reactivation’ of the food and venue areas.
Could that reactivation include some trademark Oscars passion and thrills?