Terrigal: Dart & Feather goes bust as owner bastes reviews on Google

Trendy Terrigal eatery Dart & Feather has gone bust owing an undisclosed figure to creditors. It comes as the owner went rogue on Google with some hilariously scathing responses to reviews.

Dart & Feather Restaurant publicity photos from its website. The Terrigal eatery has gone into liquidation. Picture: Dart & Feather

Less than six months after popular eatery Dart & Feather relocated to Terrigal the trendy restaurant has gone into liquidation owing thousands of dollars to creditors and facing a litany or “catastrophic” issues.

It comes as the owner has posted some hilariously scathing responses to diners’ Google reviews in which he calls them a “disaster”, “tragic” and says the restaurant clearly wasn’t for them.

Dart & Feather relocated from Davistown to Terrigal Esplanade in October and was hoping for a bumper summer holiday period to set the business up for newfound success.

But almost immediately the owner, Jay Gilchrist, was hit with a director penalty notice from the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) over pay-as-you-go and GST issues.

Mr Gilchrist tried to trade his way through but the relocation clearly didn’t prove as lucrative as first hoped and creditors stepped in earlier this month with a deed of company arrangement forcing the appointment of liquidator Amanda Lott from Australian Corporate Rehabilitation and Insolvency Solutions.

The Dart & Feather was formally located in the old Davistown Store before its relocation to Terrigal. Picture: supplied

Ms Lott described the downfall of the restaurant business as “a terrible case” which had been further complicated over “uncertainty” over its occupation certificate and the fact much of its commercial kitchen assets had been “concreted in” by Dart & Feather’s bespoke bar.

Ms Lott said the restaurant’s liquor licence allowed it to trade until 10.30pm, or 10pm on Sundays, but it’s occupation certificate was only for “business hours” between 9am-5pm weekdays.

The concrete bar has caused issues.

Pictures: Dart & Feather

She said the uncertainty left the restaurant “unsaleable” with three prospective buyers turned off by the occupation certificate, which was grandfathered to the eatery’s origins as a pancake house when the building was first built about 40 years ago.

Ms Lott said the restaurant’s concrete bar meant its commercial kitchen assets could not be removed and therefore sold to pay down creditors.

“It’s a bit of a disaster on both fronts,” she said.

The owner meanwhile has let fly in his responses to some Google reviews, blasting diners as “pandas”, “boring” and “disasters”.

“Hi panda, you’re a disaster. It’s called dashi broth and we put our twist on it with different flavours. It is not dumplings in soy sauce (face slap emoji) how embarrassing for you, especially given that you’re a panda,” he wrote to one review.

The restaurant’s food certainly looked appealing, pictured here when it was still at Davistown.

He described another reviewer as “exhausting”.

“The venue was not designed for stale, musty people, so you made the mistake of disgracing us with your prevalence (sic),” he wrote.

“Stop lying and taking out your sad life angries on a business that’s doing its best to survive ... You’re embarrassing, tragic and need to wake up to yourself. We are embarrassed by you.”

Meanwhile he took aim at another reviewer’s sex life.

“You obviously don’t match our demographic - metropolitan, vibey, cool, eclectic, eccentric etc… it must be boring being you,” he wrote.

“Going to work every day, judging people, having sex with your wife for 2 minutes at 5.15pm every Tuesday. CONGRATULATIONS. I would be embarrassed to be you. We had some teething problems to begin with, which is NORMAL. But your Karen way of carrying on is exhausting. You probably think that you’re a good person, but you’re not. You’re tragically embarrassing and I can’t imagine anybody wanting to be anything like you. Go and google what carbonara is you uncultured disaster. I would tell you, but I’m not willing to waste any extra time on tragic Davistown disasters.”

Attempts to contact Mr Gilchrist were unsuccessful.