John Singleton goes on $100m pub crawl

LEGENDARY ad man visited 11 pubs in 15 hours before buying up battling pubs in Sydney.

John Singleton made his business partners go on a marathon pub crawl before he would commit funds / The Australian

LEGENDARY ad man John Singleton went on a 200km pub crawl before investing millions buying up battling pubs in Sydney.

Mr Singleton is part of a consortium with hotel investors Paddy Coughlan and Rodney Kelly that is spending $100 million buying troubled pubs.

The move is set to radically change the face of the Sydney pub scene. The consortium has already spent $12 million buying Kinselas in Darlinghurst, central Sydney, and $10.6 million on the Peakhurst Inn in the city's south.

But Mr Singleton, who is valued by BRW magazine at $238 million, made his business partners jump through hoops on a marathon pub crawl before he finally agreed to stump up his funds.

The pub crawl took in 11 pubs over 15 hours from Sydney to the Entrance, including Dawn Fraser's former Riverview Hotel in Balmain and "Iguana Joes" in Gosford, on the Central Coast.

The business partners passed Mr Singleton's beer goggles test. They are now looking at spending a further $80 million by Christmas.

"We might end up with three pubs, or 33," Mr Singleton said.

Read the full story at The Daily Telegraph.