Pub baron’s flagship firm in administration owing millions of dollars

Sydney pub king Fraser Short has put his flagship firm The Sydney Collective into administration less than a year after he offloaded most of his holdings in a $300m deal.

Hotelier Fraser Short has put his hospitality company into administration.

Sydney pub king Fraser Short has put his flagship hospitality company The Sydney Collective into administration owing creditors, including the taxman, about $5.5m

The administration comes less than a year after Mr Short offloaded most of his holdings to the Laundy Hotel Group in a $300m deal.

Mr Short, 48, sold five hotels to the Laundy group, headed by the billionaire pub baron Arthur Laundy, including the Watsons Bay Hotel in Sydney, in the landmark deal in February.

This week Adam Farnsworth, of Farnsworth Carson, was appointed as administrator to The Sydney Collective, the hospitality group that previously held a portfolio of pubs, restaurants and hotels across the city.  Neither Mr Short nor Mr Farnsworth replied to a request for comment. According to a report to creditors lodged by Mr Farnsworth to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, The Sydney Collective owes the Australian Taxation Office $1.08m and assorted trade creditors $297,909.

The biggest amount of $4.41m is owed to the Warwick and Yates Trust, an entity linked to his Short family. The company’s assets were listed as a $70,000 Tesla X and a $500 trading account, according to the report lodged with ASIC. Mr Short lists his residential address as a three-level harbour front mansion in Sydney’s Vaucluse, purchased in 2016 for $8.75m.

The Sydney Collective was accused three yeas ago by the United Workers Union of underpaying workers at its Watsons Bay Hotel. The venue was described by one employee as one of “the worst place I ever worked.” “I worked there as a chef for four years and I would often work 60 hours a week, and many of those hours were unpaid,” said the employee on the union’s website. The Sydney Collective reportedly later paid three employees outstanding amounts, including superannuation and accrued annual leave and apologised. Mr Short denied there was a systematic issue with wage payments.

Hotelier Fraser Short

Mr Short is the son of the late Warwick Short, who owned and operated a string of pubs including the The Stoned Crow, Woolloomooloo Bay Hotel, The Marlborough in Newtown, The Racecourse Hotel in Randwick, and Scubar Downunder in Sydney Central..

The Short family’s separate business, W. Short Hospitality, still holds some of NSW’s most iconic pubs and hotels unrelated to Fraser Short.

They include The Australian Heritage Hotel and The Glenmore in The Rocks, The Royal in Leichhardt, The Tudor in Redfern, Toormina Hotel in Coffs Harbour, Misfits at The Redfern, The Sawtell Hotel in Sawtell and Moonee Beach Hotel in Moonee Beach. The family sold the popular Seabreeze Beach Hotel on the NSW Mid-North Coast earlier this year.

“I grew up around hotels from the age of dot but never really saw myself going into the business so I studied interior design,” Mr Short told the online publication Eat, Drink, Play in 2013. “However, a few things changed in my dad’s life and he needed a hand.” Mr Short opened Scubar in Sydney central with his brother in 1997 followed by the Cargo Bar.

Revive Financial head of business restructuring and insolvency Jarvis Archer said retail and hospitality businesses were expected to continue to experience high levels of insolvency for at least the first half of 2024. “Retailers and restaurants have generally reported very quiet trading over December,” said Mr Archer. “This is particularly worrying for those businesses who rely on the Christmas trading period to bolster the rest of their year.

“The pre-Christmas period is very difficult as cashflow can slow to a trickle until February, while rent, wages tax and loan payments don’t stop.”