Three business partners who loved their favourite bar so much that they bought it are now seizing the opportunity of Hull Trinity Festival to take it to the next level.
Jan Lee, husband Paul and colleague Lee Stead bought Oscars bar in Silver Street, Hull, less than a year ago to add to a business portfolio which included a modular buildings manufacture and a steel company.
Now they will use next week’s Hull Trinity Festival to launch regular live music nights at Oscars and to unveil an outdoor bar service which will make its debut at The Almighty Fundraiser in Holy Trinity Church on Friday September 25.
And as bar owners who don’t do things by halves, the trio have also signed up Oscars as main sponsor of Hull Trinity Festival, which will feature top bands Eliza and the Bear and The Beat headlining the main stage outside Holy Trinity Church on Saturday September 26 and Sunday September 27.
Jan and Paul made their first moves into business by launching Spacemaker Modular and Portable Buildings Ltd in 2005. Four years later they were joined by Lee and set up Anti Vandal Solutions and Fabrications Ltd. Last December they added Oscars, getting the keys on a Sunday night and working flat out from early Monday morning to open in the afternoon.
Jan revealed that they literally started from scratch to set up Spacemaker in Raven Street, East Hull.
She said: “We have given up our house, bought a caravan on eBay for £1,000 and lived next to the factory for three or four years.”
Turnover has increased from around £200,000 to £1.2 million and from starting out on their own the couple have now created around 20 jobs from the three business ventures.
Jan said: “We never set out to be a huge business. We just wanted to work for ourselves and it grew from there. We are just taking a slow approach, not investing vast amounts of money and not borrowing from banks.”
They decided to buy Oscars even before it became available and they have made change by extending the opening hours and installing seven big screens showing live sport.
Jan said: “We used to go in there a lot and we offered to buy it because we felt it could do well as a sports cocktail bar, which nowhere else was offering. At first the owner didn’t want to sell but in time he changed his mind so we took it over on a Monday morning and worked like crazy to open at 2pm.
“We decided to sponsor Hull Trinity Festival because it’s a great event and because we want to support HullBID, who organise the event. A lot of people complain that the Avenues area is busier but the way to overcome that is to work together and work with HullBID and make sure things are happening in the city centre.”
Lee Chapman, manager of Oscars, said the new live music night will add to the attractions in the Old Town.
He said: “We’ve installed a new sound system so the live shows over the weekend of Hull Trinity Festival will be the start of regular live music nights at Oscars. We’re also operating a bar inside Holy Trinity Church for the Almighty Fundraiser and we’re having some outdoor bars specially built now so we can do more of that in the future.
“A few other bars nearby have their own live music nights so we will fit in with them and hold our events on a different night to try and make sure there is something happening in the Old Town every night.”
Kathryn Shillito, HullBID city centre manager, said: “We are really grateful to the owners of Oscars for sponsoring this year’s Hull Trinity Festival. Their generosity has enabled us to bring in some more big names to perform alongside our top local bands and attract the crowds which will help businesses throughout the city.
“The work they have done at Oscars makes it clear that they see all of this as an investment in terms of adding to the appeal of the Old Town and making people aware that it is an area with a lot of quality and a lot of variety.”
