Seven new Murraylands businesses to look out for in the lead up to Christmas
From unique book stores, a game-changing frozen yoghurt shop to fine dining experiences, these new businesses are hitting the mark in Murray Bridge. Meet the faces behind the success here.
Adelaide Hills & Murraylands
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It’s been a difficult few years for regional small business with Covid lockdowns and travel restrictions.
Now, with the River Murray floods causing some uncertainty in communities like the Murraylands, we’ve decided to put the spotlight on some new businesses worth the trip to Murray Bridge for.
Fiction & Friction - Indie Bookseller
Shop 2, 31/35 Seventh Street, Murray Bridge
Murray Bridge is home to the unique Fiction & Friction - Indie Bookseller, the first specialty bookstore of its kind dedicated to independently published books.
The doors opened just three week ago to such fanfare, owner Britt Schulz said she had customers drive over from Melbourne just to be there opening day.
And, in the first week of trade, the shop sold 298 books, proving there is a strong market for what Britt said was a niche trade.
Before opening the shopfront, Fiction & Friction built its reputation in the independent book community online.
The online store has operated for two years and has sold over 20,000 books.
Britt said her business stocked a range of genres with a main focus on romance books but extending to from fantasy to contemporary, dark to light, young adult to adult and so much more.
Ponyboy
Murray Bridge Green shopping centre
A horse-loving duo have teamed up to launch a new frozen yoghurt and casual dining eatery in Murray Bridge.
Local jockey Jessica Eaton and racing administrator Jessica Di Pinto opened new business Ponyboy, a DIY frozen yoghurt bar with thick shakes and a hot food menu featuring loaded fries, loaded subs, sides and dough dots.
Ponyboy is located in Murray Bridge Green near the Drakes Supermarket.
Jessica, who won the Adelaide Apprentice Jockey Premiership and the coveted John Letts Medal as South Australia’s leading jockey in 2021, explained the motivations behind Ponyboy.
“Horse racing can be a relentless industry to work in and, while we both love what we do, we were keen to put some time and energy into a passion project that was separate to our full-time jobs with racehorses,” Eaton said.
“I moved to Murray Bridge over two years ago and it’s been an amazing place to live and work.
“We wanted to bring something new, fun and exciting to Murray Bridge and we hope the local community will really embrace Ponyboy.”
Di Pinto, who works alongside Eaton in the thoroughbred racing industry and has extensive experience in the hospitality scene, said Ponyboy gives Murray Bridge locals access to an exciting new concept that has proved extremely popular in Adelaide and other major capital cities.
“We’re proud of the fact Ponyboy is run by locals, for locals and we’re not just a big franchise from the city,” Di Pinto said.
“Murray Bridge is a growing, thriving community and we want to grow and thrive with it.
“Our hot food menu takes inspiration from American cuisine with slow-cooked pulled pork, house-battered southern fried chicken and cheeseburger toppings just some of the standouts.”
Ponyboy is open seven days a week, from 11am – 8pm, serving lunch, dinner and everything in between.
Slice of Delight - Murray Bridge
Slice of Delight has been operating in Murray Bridge since November, 2021 and business has been booming for Nathan and Felicia Hildebrand.
The duo moved to Murray Bridge late last year and quickly set up their start-up venture, decorating cakes and and selling slices, biscuits and rumballs.
The pair quickly found success in their full-time operation working from home and Felicia said the pair had been “extremely busy”.
“It’s really nice here, we wanted to try something different when we moved over and we didn’t think it would go as well as it has but it’s nice,” she said.
“It’s been really good for us and really good to meet a lot of the people around here and everyone is really nice, so thoroughly enjoying it.”
Nathan said word of mouth had seen Slice of Delight pick up orders for jobs outside of the Murraylands region.
“We’ve got a few regulars and lots of new enquires every day ... we’ve got a couple of orders in Adelaide too,” he said.
The pair combine to make the beautiful creations; Nathan bakes everything and Felicia decorates it all.
The pair detailed ambitions of one day opening a shop front in Murray Bridge and expand operations.
But, for now they will continue to use Facebook as their main point of contact.
1924 Riverfront Steakhouse
Sturt Reserve, Murray Bridge
1924 Riverfront Steakhouse is located in a prime location in what is often called the ‘jewel in the crown’ of Murray Bridge - the popular Sturt Reserve.
The restaurant opened in July and got its liquor license in September and has experienced its busiest two weeks of trading the last two weeks.
Unfortunately, 1924 Riverfront Steakhouse will be forced to close from December 12 as flood waters will see power turned off at the restaurant’s location.
However, manager Damien O’Riley ensured the community the business would open back up as soon as possible with the same enthusiasm it was operating with in its first few months of trade.
“The feedback has been good ... we’ll be back up and running as soon as possible,” he said.
“We’ve built a pergola for outdoor dining and it was finished the day we found out we have to shut down and we were going to have a grand opening but we might hold that off,” he said.
The business still has a week of trade to go and check it out but it is one for the ‘to-do list’ wehen
The Mustard Seed Murray Bridge
Shop 7, Murray Bridge Marketplace, Murray Bridge
Murray Bridge is now home to a new Mediterranean and Indian restaurant with roof-top bar offering a fine dine-in experience and a large takeaway menu.
The Mustard Seed has been a popular restaurant in Hahndorf for about six years and now has a second home in Murray Bridge.
The new store held its grand opening on December 2 with live belly dancing entertaining diners as they enjoyed authentic Indian and Mediterranean food.
A Mustard Seed spokesperson said the store opened in Murray Bridge once the owners recognised a strong demand from the region.
“The response from people has been overwhelming, our first night was completely sold out,” the spokesperson said.
“We are getting good reviews and it has been a really warm welcome from the Murray Bridge people.”
While the dine-in experience in the Murray Bridge Marketplace has been popular, The Mustard Seed will soon expand to do deliveries as well.
“We do take away, our website has online ordering and we will soon will do delivery as well.”
Oriental Garden
16 Adelaide Rd, Murray Bridge
The Oriental Garden Chinese Restaurant is not a new name in the Murray Bridge dining scene.
However, the owners are new and lots has changed at the popular Adelaide Road restaurant.
The new owners Brendyne Lowe and Janet Zhang closed the door for a couple of weeks after taking over, extensively renovating and preparing
Brendyne told The Messenger while the restaurant was set to enjoy a “whole fresh start”, the restaurant was an iconic business and evoked nostalgia in the community.
“This place was somewhere where people go for special occasions, for date nights … a lot of friends of mine said they had wedding anniversaries here, and birthdays,” he said.
“It has a good name, it’s an institution.”
PETstock Country Murray Bridge
109B Maurice Road, Murray Bridge
A new pet supply shop, specialising in all things pets but with an’ equine and rural focus’ has opened in Murray Bridge.
PETstock Country Murray Bridge manager Patti Bolt said the doors opened in August and the store catered for domestic household pet supplies through to chickens, cattle, sheep, horses and maintenance for hobby farms.
“We do equine and rural supplies - we’ve got fencing and drenching stuff as well as our usual domestic pet things,” she said.
“We’ve got all your pet supplies for dogs and cats and we do sell live animals - we’ve got frogs, turtles, snakes, bearded dragons to birds and quite a lot of fish.”
Patti said the shop was open seven days and employed 12 staff.
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