Stadium cooks up restaurant interest
A READY market of hotel guests and the opening of the new Queensland Country Bank Stadium have prompted renewed efforts to lease one of the city’s best restaurant sites, which will help revitalise Townsville’s top dining strip.
The former Nando’s flagship restaurant at 8-10 Palmer St is being marketed for lease by Colliers International. The property comes with a $1 million fit-out and proximity to hotel and apartment properties, with a total pool of 800 rooms, which enjoyed occupancies close to 80 per cent last year.
Colliers associate director Neville Smith said the recipe presented a very attractive opportunity for an experienced operator.
“We are very confident we will find an operator for this space,” Mr Smith said.
“The big advantages are that it is fully fitted out, ready to go, and the restaurant is sitting underneath one of the most awarded hotels in Townsville.”
That property is the Grand Hotel Townsville, which won
Australian tourism awards in 2017 and 2018 and is a fourtime state tourism award winner.
Grand Hotel general manager and property owner representative Troy Scott said all of the Palmer St accommodation houses performed well over the past year, reaching an average occupancy of 79 per cent. Mr Scott said this was 15 per cent up on the previous year and well ahead of the “glory days” of the mining boom in 2012 when it reached 74 per cent.
“The rest reached 72 per of market cent occupancy, up 14 per cent year on year. This shows that the Palmer St hotels have a consistent business mix and have the most concentrated audience out of anywhere in town,” Mr Scott said.
He said the stadium presented new opportunities for growth for city businesses.
“The stadium opening will not only create more demand for Palmer St but this will also increase the length of stay for visitors,” Mr Scott said.
“It is not just the game nights, it is the nights either side.”
Knight Frank agent Louise
Slater said the stadium had boosted inquiry for property in the city area but that the restaurant market was very competitive.
Ms Slater said Palmer St was competing with The Ville Resort-casino, North Ward with new food operators like Balabite and Grandma’s, two additional locations for Otto’s Fresh Food Market, City Lane, The Strand and soon Flinders Lane.
“We have some vacancies in Flinders St and inquiry has picked up. They are all saying their interest is because of the stadium,” Ms Slater said.