Veteran Rod Salmon and his son Nate have emerged as the buyers of the Gallagher clan’s Chelsea Hotel in north shore heartland, Chatswood.
Patrick Gallagher and partners bought the Hotel early 2018 from Solotel, for circa $20 million.
The two-level Chelsea resides in a 765sqm strata site, opposite the western entrance to Chatswood station, providing public bar, bistro, bistro bar, and gaming with 30 machines.
It also holds new Council approval for an extension to trading hours, from 1am to 4am.
Having weathered the COVID downturn, seeing high-rise Chatswood office buildings deserted, in August Gallagher group put down circa $50 million for the Campion family’s Longueville Hotel, and with the Chelsea partners eager to pursue other interests, the under-cooked pub was listed mid-September.
Rod Salmon’s outfit held up to a dozen pubs in the early 2000s, including the Sawdust, Wentworth and Crown Parramatta, but sold them all by around 2014.
The family still owned a warehouse at Rydalmere, and holding an errant hotel licence opted to create and launch the Palate Hotel. After several years and operators working it as a pub-style restaurant, the Salmons acquired gaming entitlements and turned it into a Top100 performer.
They have now put up $30.5 million for the freehold going concern at Chatswood, due to settle in about two weeks, and the younger Salmon, who joined the family business a few years’ ago, says its “exciting times” for them.
“It seemed like an absolute no-brainer,” says Nate of the new acquisition.
There are reportedly plenty of “plans in the works” including a renovation and redesign, and the Salmons are eager to act on the DA to create an outdoor deck, and make better use of the upstairs space.
“We can build something the area’s crying out for or lacking, like a nice whiskey and poker bar; something cooler and more interesting.”
One of only three pubs with gaming in a strong gaming precinct, Nate says they will replace the machines and reconfigure the area to be “somewhere we would play”. Both he and his father play the EGMs and feel it gives them a better understanding of what is wanted, versus the somewhat “clinical” feel of a lot of clubs and casino-style rooms.
Faced with a big new commitment at a point in time where gaming is again facing social headwinds, Nate concedes it’s a “scary” game to be in.
“It’s pretty wild at the moment,” says the Salmon scion. “But if we can make it work we will, so long as the government doesn’t mess with anything.”
The sale campaign was managed by JLL Hotels’ Ben McDonald, who says a key driver behind interest in the asset was the “diminishing availability of comparable” hotel opportunities.
“Chelsea Hotel presents as an ideal ‘bolt on’ acquisition given the low-cost operating model, and is sure to provide the incoming purchaser with an opportunity to capitalise on the enormous near term growth prospects of Chatswood’s town centre and railway precinct,” says McDonald.
