Wrest Point Casino celebrates 50 years

Tasmanian businessman Greg Farrell is spending $65m to renovate Australia’s first legal casino as it marks half century of operation.

Greg Farrell inside Wrest Point. Source: supplied

Tasmanian businessman Greg Farrell, head of the family-owned Federal Group, is spending up to $65m refurbishing Wrest Point, Australia’s first legal casino, which on Friday celebrates a half century of operation.

Since its opening in 1973, Wrest Point’s glamorous cabaret acts have attracted some of the world’s biggest acts including Tina Turner, Jerry Lewis, and Shirley Bassey and the casino and hotel has also been a favourite venue for the odd ALP national conference in the 1980s and 1990s.

But come July 1 the Federal Group will lose the poker machine monopoly it has enjoyed for a quarter of a century across Tasmania.

“It’s probably fair to say we were prepared for the situation of losing the poker machine monopoly,” Farrell told The Weekend Australian in his first major interview.

“We had held the licence to operate gaming machines in hotels and clubs in Tasmania for 25 years. And so the likelihood of a change was high. And we still operate the game of Keno in Tasmania.”

There are several upgraded dining options at Wrest Point.

Farrell, who has been overseeing the casino and hotel’s renovation for several years and expects to finish by year’s end, on Friday will welcome 450 guests to a party celebrating the casino and hotel which was opened by his parents Greg and Dolores Farrell on February 10, 1973.

But in planning the renovations Greg Farrell and his family members have been careful not to cannibalise on the operations of their other highly successful Tasmanian casinos and hotels which dot the Hobart CBD as well as the outer reaches of the Apple Isle.

These include the luxury Saffire Freycinet Lodge at Coles Bay, the Henry Jones Art Hotel and MACq 01 hotel at Hobart and the Country Club Casino near Launceston.

Farrell says his up-market Hobart-based hotels Henry Jones and MACq 01 attract slightly different types of leisure clientele, slightly different age groups and people with slightly different aspirations.

But Farrell has ensured that the Wrest Point Casino, 2.5km from the Hobart CBD and with commanding views over the Derwent River, and its accompanying 269-room art deco hotel tower, will not compete with his other tourism attractions.

“We don’t believe Wrest Point will cannibalise them,” Farrell said. “We have tried to put a lot of effort into ensuring that we don’t cannibalise the market.”

“There is a lot of leisure business that comes into Hobart and we’re more than competitive in ensuring that Wrest Point remains at high occupancies and very high levels of satisfaction.”

The refurbished birdcage area.

The renovations of Wrest Point have included introducing a whole new casino gaming floor overlooking the Derwent River, renovating the hotel’s rooms and suites, and refurbishing the Birdcage Bar and Lounge replete with its Charles Billich murals, crystal studded revolving peacocks and introducing generous $75 cocktail high teas. Farrell, who has overseen the renovations, envisages the majority of it will be completed by year end.

The Farrell family has also introduced the Longhorn Smokehouse restaurant to the casino. Already popular with the Hobart dining scene it offers southern American style BBQ flavours matched with Tasmania’s best meats.

One of Hobart’s dining institution’s The Point Revolving Restaurant, replete with its old school steak Diane and flambé prawns (both prepared at table) and 360 degree revolving views of the Tasman Bridge, Mount Wellington and the River Derwent has been fully refurbished and sits atop the 17-level Wrest Point tower.

Employing 2500 staff, the Farrell family’s Federal Group is Tasmania’s largest private employer, and Greg Farrell has ensured that Wrest Point appeals to many different types of locals and mainlander tourists.

Wrest Point from the air. Source: supplied

Unlike other major Australian tourism destinations such as Cairns, Farrell says Hobart was never hurt by the lack of international arrivals during and after Covid because it didn’t depend on them in the first place.

“We are seeing international guests but Tasmania really has always been more of a place of appeal to the domestic market rather than an international market. And so I think coming out of Covid Tasmania was better positioned. Our research shows that Tasmania ranks consistently very highly as the place that Australians would like to visit.”

These days the Farrell family concentrate on five star accommodation assets. But they did cop some flack when they developed the up-market Saffire Freycinet Lodge at Coles Bay a few years ago.

“You know in some respects a lot of people thought we were nuts to build it,” Farrell confesses.

“Because Tasmania had not had a destination or resort of that calibre. People probably didn’t think it could be done. But yeah, it’s been extremely successful,” says Farrell, who finds it difficult to get accommodation for himself at the lodge because of its ongoing popularity.

These days Farrell says he fends off numerous approaches from hotel investors to buy Federal’s portfolio of hotels and the casinos.

“We’ve had multiple approaches over the years,” he says.

But would he sell?

“We’d be very reluctant. The family is very proud of the portfolio. I mean the Farrell family really kicked off tourism in this state. You know there wasn’t any tourism before Wrest Point.”

The writer was a guest of Wrest Point