Moran Hospitality, the family-owned group behind the Red Cow Moran Hotel and other ventures, has opened a new venue at the former Chophouse bar and restaurant in Dublin 4, weeks after it closed its doors.
The group, which is owned and operated by the family of late west Limerick-born hotelier Tom Moran, agreed to take on the lease after former owners Kevin Arundel and Jillian Mulcahy shuttered the well-known premises near the Aviva Stadium in early September.
In a post on social media, they said “constant rising costs” had made it “impossible” for them to continue trading.
The venue has now reopened and is set to be renamed once Moran Hospitality has put its own stamp on it, group director Tommy Moran told The Irish Times on Wednesday.
“The place does need a facelift,” he said. “I think that was one of the things Kevin was aware of and wasn’t in a position to to deal with. So that’s on the cards. We’re chatting to some designers, interior designers about that.”
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On the name of the new venture, Mr Moran said it will “certainly” have the word ‘cow’ in the name.
“It happened very quickly,” he said. “We were made aware that Kevin might be moving on. We knew the landlord as well, so he had mentioned that Kevin was considering handing back the keys. So the opportunity came up very quickly.”
He said the family are “big sports fans” and had been aware of the Chophouse site “forever” as frequent visitors to Landsdowne Road and the Aviva.
Asked whether the issue of costs that the previous owners had raised at the time of the closure was a concern, Mr Moran said: “We’re very conscious of it. We’ve got a relatively big machine here between the Red Cow Moran Hotel and other things. We’ve got various different things going on and costs are a factor in all of those.”
But he said the group has more “buying power” than smaller operators. “We’ve probably got a bit of excess capacity at different times of the week, where perhaps we can get some economies between the various venues as well, which may help. But as well, I think we just hope we enjoy the place.”
The Moran group also operates a city centre hotel called Wren Urban Nest, the first net carbon-zero hotel in the Republic.
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