Popular Beach Club at the Waterfront reinstated, liquor licence renewed
The popular Beach Club at the Darwin Waterfront is set to return after the Director of Liquor Licensing renewed its approval.
Northern Territory
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THE popular Beach Club at the Darwin Waterfront is set to return after the Director of Liquor Licensing renewed its approval.
It means local and tourists will once again be able to purchase takeaway food and alcohol from businesses at the Waterfront and enjoy it on the lawn area around the lagoon.
It comes after Waterfront businesses submitted an application late last month for the club to be re-established, after it proved a huge hit last Dry.
Hot Tamale and Snapper Rocks owner David Robinson said the Beach Club had attracted arguably more locals than tourists last Dry and had made the precinct more vibrant and family-friendly.
“It created an atmosphere I haven’t seen in Darwin before, and it was based around locals, families and activation of the Waterfront,” he said.
“Having the Beach Club with the furniture, it really activates the area in the daytime, for both locals and tourists.”
Darwin Waterfront Corporate general manager Sam Burke said the Beach Club was an “incredibly successful concept” that had increased attendance and boosted business at the precinct.
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“The Waterfront Beach Club is now a feature offering in Darwin and has been embraced by the local community, revolutionising the Waterfront’s ‘resort style’ experience without a single reported incident,” he said.
“Additionally, as patrons returned to dine-in Waterfront restaurants, the ability to trade out has helped local businesses to bounce back.
“The Waterfront Beach Club offers the best way for locals and visitors to experience our tropical lifestyle and bolster Waterfront restaurant trade in the busy dry season period.”
He said while the licence approval had already been granted, meaning takeaway drinks and food could be served from late today, the formal Beach Club would only launch in the first week of June with the installation of extra furniture on the lawn.
Hospitality NT chief executive Alex Bruce said the renewal of the Beach Club licence was a “commonsense outcome that increases Darwin’s vibrant hospitality scene”.
“While the reopening of international borders are still off in the Never Never, this is responding to that by bringing to Darwin a style of hospitality you’re used to getting in South-East Asia,” he said.
The Waterfront Beach Club ran during last year’s dry season under emergency powers brought in at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
It was initially understood that renewing the licence would require legislative changes, but Small Business Minister Paul Kirby said the government had found a more streamlined way for its approval to be renewed.
“The Director of Liquor Licensing has had the capacity, under this catering authority, to make that decision,” he said.
“I do understand that if there were significant objections to it, then it probably would have had to go back through a more fulsome commission process.”
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