CLOSED | Four Restaurants Shutdown Within A Week

AS THE stream of restaurateurs and operators beating a path to Manchester continues, it was inevitable that some would struggle to cope with the influx of new blood and new grub into the city.

We've had no help with rates at all...

This week sees the announced closure of no less than four city centre restaurants.

Struggling King Street fine-dining restaurant, Quill, is the latest to shut up shop, its combination of extravagant tasting menus, black velvet and ‘true exclusivity’ failing to strike a chord with punters following its flash VIP bash in October.

Rumours of its supposed sale have been doing the rounds for weeks.

A closure notice posted on the door of the King Street restaurant on Tuesday 14 June reads: 'We have always prided ourselves on doing things the right way and we are currently in the process of doing a full housekeep, closing all accounts and making sure all staff and suppliers are fully paid.'

Quill closure notice

Confidential has also received word of the closure of Khan BaBa on Castlefield’s Liverpool Road, a run-of-the-mill Indian restaurant which always seemed to struggle in the mighty shadow of the well-oiled Akbar’s machine next door.

Though we’re told the unit at no.73 has been taken on by new owners and will remain a restaurant, called Mace, serving a mix of ‘Indian and Continental’ foods with a bold sixties themed interior.

Khan Baba

Meanwhile, Cross Street-based restaurants, Splendid Kitchen and Grinch, both announced their respective closures this weekend, with both sets of owners citing the delayed Second City Crossing (2CC) Metrolink as the cause.

Splendid owner Mike Edge wrote: ‘…a combination of many things, not least the metro link roadworks that have blighted Manchester since almost the day we opened as The Splendid Sausage Company, mean that from next week we can do this no longer.’

A statement released by Mud Crab industries, owners of the Grinch restaurant, a Manchester stalwart for over two decades, read: ‘The Tram works have won, an area destroyed, others have closed and so must we.’

Splendid Kitchen

The Grinch

Works on the 2CC – which will link Victoria Station with St Peter’s Square via Cross Street and Corporation Street - began in January 2014.

However, significant delays, including the exhumation of 277 bodies and a collapsed sewer on Cross Street, mean the project, which has caused major traffic disruption across the city centre, will not complete until well into next year.

Critics of the Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) project have questioned how a diversion under a mile long can take almost three years to complete.

TfGM Director, Peter Cushing, told Confidential that although he was saddened to hear of the loss of the restaurants, TfGM had offered their support to businesses along the route, including signage, a 'dedicated stakeholder team' and help with business rates (the full TfGM statement can be seen below).

It is a claim strongly refuted by the Splendid Kitchen owner. “We’ve had no help with rates at all,” says Edge. “Often the first we heard of any changes to the trams came from the media.”

Metrolink 2CC works on Cross Street

TfGM Director, Peter Cushing's statement in full: