Melbourne club kings Nick and Daniel Russian transform into COVID-19 cleaners
Melbourne’s night-life spots may have been closed for months, but club kings Nick and Daniel Russian have pivoted away from celebrity haunts to help the state’s fight against coronavirus. This is what they’re up to.
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Melbourne club kings Nick and Daniel Russian have become COVID-19 cleaners while the night-life industry is in lockdown.
The brothers, who owned after-dark celebrity haunt Eve, and continue to helm CBD bar Bambi and Together Events, have pivoted into coronavirus prevention, spraying offices and venues with a protective agent, which helps prevents surface-to-human transmission of infections.
“When you work for yourself, you’ve always got to look at other avenues. You don’t know when your income will dry up,” Daniel said.
They set up Academy HR as a labour hire firm and expanded into facilities management. When COVID-19 hit, the bar tsars added cleaning services to the menu.
Their surface protection service, which launched in March, already has 1000 clients.
Meanwhile, Daniel predicts Melbourne nightclubs and bars won’t reopen until 2021.
“You never want to speak dire of the industry that feeds you, but you’ve got to be a realist,” he said, adding: “And I don’t think events (niche parties) will start happening until the back end of next year.”
Other Melbourne club owners echoed Daniel’s comments recently.
Simon Lennox, who owns The Osborne and Wink Wink, said: “Nightclubs as we know it, it’s difficult moving forward and we’ll need to reinvent ourselves.’’
Drewe Bellmaine, who runs Riva added: “Nightclubs I really worry about. You’ve got to be realistic and optimistic, but how do you tell people where to stand and stop crowding?”
Martha Tsamis, who owns Chasers and Inflation, is optimistic about an October reopening, but at a smaller scale. “I am hopeful,” she said.
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