Lobster Cave owner Bill Ferg dodges liquidation despite debt woes

The owner of Melbourne’s Lobster Cave has avoided having a liquidator appointed to his renowned restaurant despite filings revealing his debt woes have blown out to as much as $17m.

The owner of Melbourne’s Lobster Cave has avoided having a liquidator appointed to his famed restaurant. Picture: Mark Stewart

The owner of Melbourne’s Lobster Cave has avoided having a liquidator appointed to his famed restaurant although new corporate filings show his debt woes have blown out to as much as $17m.

Vasilios Fergadiotis, better known as Bill Ferg, has been in court for months after non-bank lender and buy-now, pay-later service provider Humm Group launched legal action against his company, Lob Nominees.

Lob Nominees owns the business name Lobster Cave, as well as the restaurant’s website.

Flexicommercial – a subsidiary of Humm Group – originally launched the application for the winding up order in August.

Bill Ferg has been in court for months after Humm Group launched legal action. Picture: Facebook

Winding up notices are usually issued by creditors of a company in order to enforce the payment of a debt.

If the debt is found legitimate and a company is unable to pay, the business is usually placed into liquidation by the court.

The claim against Lob Nominees, heard in New South Wales’ Supreme Court, was adjourned several times before it was finally heard last week.

The court heard the two parties reached a last minute agreement to settle the matter.

Mr Ferg told the Herald Sun the matter had been “resolved to everyone’s satisfaction”.

“It is subject to a confidentiality clause; therefore, I cannot comment further,” he said.

Humm Group was contacted for comment.

Mr Ferg told the Herald Sun the matter had been “resolved to everyone’s satisfaction”.

It comes as the Herald Sun previously revealed that Mr Ferg, who has run The Lobster Cave in Beaumaris for close to four decades, was hit with a near $1m bankruptcy claim linked to the takeover of a former business.

It marked a dramatic escalation in his financial woes which have to date involved a number of his companies which have collapsed into insolvency.

Mr Ferg’s companies, Extramile Trading, Green Earth Industries and Marsh Dairy, all collapsed this year with a combined near $17m in debt, analysis of liquidation reports shows.

In reports to creditors, administrator Stephen Dixon, who has been appointed to all three of these businesses, put the maximum amount of debt at more than $16,700,000, when added up.

This includes nearly $10m owed to unsecured creditors and more than $600,000 owed to employees, his highest estimates reveal.

In May an elderly driver accidentally ploughed through the Lobster Cave restaurant. Picture: Facebook

The Lobster Cave made headlines in 2017 when then opposition leader Matthew Guy was spotted having dinner with an alleged Melbourne mafia boss in an incident dubbed “lobster with the mobster”.

In May an elderly driver accidentally ploughed through the Beaumaris restaurant, leaving customers diving for cover.

He previously wrote to his Lobster Cave customers on the business’s Facebook page denying that “issues” for his other businesses would affect his restaurant.

“The fact is that it is business as usual at Lobster Cave. Nothing has changed at Lobster Cave or in how we operate,” he wrote.