Friendly Inn returns to Thompson family hands
1 Sep 11
Thursday 18 August 2011 was a crisp sunny day in old Sydney town.
A great day to buy a pub.
The auction of the Friendly Inn was held in Pitt St and was second in a list of nine properties to go under the hammer that day.
When the first auction started, there were about 50 people in attendance.
The first property, in Bondi Junction, was passed in at $2.02m.
The auctioneer talked up our historic pub well and by the time bidding started, there was standing room only with a number of rows of people standing at the back of the room, eager to see the proceedings.
Bidding opened at 10:52 and was slow to get off the ground with the initial bid being $1.4m. There were four contenders in the room.
26 bids and eight minutes later, we had a new owner of the Friendly Inn with the property sold for $2.01m.
In a show of how popular the auction was, the majority of the people in the room left as soon as it was done-and-dusted.
As it turns out, the new owner is the next generation of a previous owner of the Inn.
The Thompson family of Berry have a long affiliation in this area having owned the Great Southern Hotel in Berry for more than ten years which they sold in 2007.
They had also previously owned the Friendly Inn in the 80’s.
The buyer on this occasion, on behalf of the family was Mr Peter Thompson, who said after the sale that his family was looking forward to taking a hands-on approach to running the hotel.
Let's wish them all the best in making 'the local' everything it has the potential to be.
Allan Lockyer