Popular Manchester bar is saved by a pre-pack admin

A close-up, shallow-focus shot of several brass beer taps with black handles lined up on a bar counter, with a blurred bartender working in the background.

Clarke Bell was able to rescue one of Manchester’s leading bars from having to call time.

The bar, based in Manchester’s Northern Quarter, was insolvent and threatened with creditor action which would have resulted in its closure. Instead however, through a ‘pre-pack administration’, it was possible to save the business and the employees’ jobs.

The bar opened in November 2006, targeting people working in Manchester’s TV and media industry. However, it struggled to establish itself in the Northern Quarter’s busy bar scene. It had been up for sale for more than a year, but had failed to attract a buyer.

The owner of the bar had formed a new company after what she called “the need for a management restructuring”.

“The Administration was a way of clearing the decks and starting again,” she said.

Manchester-based Clarke Bell were appointed as Administrator of the bar and John Bell, its senior partner, said:

“We are delighted to have been able to keep the business going and to save the employees’ jobs.

The alternative was that the bar would have become yet another bar to close, with the loss of more jobs.”

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