Dunedin’s Mad Butcher store will shut down after a year of unsuccessful searches for new premises.
According to franchiser and store owner Michael Morton, the business had no choice but to close, as it couldn’t find a suitable retail site in the area.
The store’s landlord is car dealer and Dunedin City councillor Andrew Simms.
Morton said Simms was expanding his car yard as the butchery’s lease expired.
“We’ve been looking for close to a year to try and find something else in South Dunedin. It’s really hard because most stuff in South Dunedin is what they call light industrial,” he said.
“You can have a little showroom and warehousing or production area, but you can’t really, not really, have retail. So you try and go for all of the business, get resource consent and things like that, and we’ve found landlords just aren’t interested in doing it.”
He said South Dunedin’s zoning was unsuitable for a shop like Mad Butcher, but he wanted to remain in the area.
The store had operated in Dunedin for nearly 15 years and performed well. It also had 15 employees, with two butchers having been offered jobs elsewhere, while the rest will finish up.
Morton said he has no issue with Simms’s decisions.
“It’s business. He’s been a good landlord in that place over that time, but, you know, it’s his building, it’s his project; he’ll do what he wants to do with it.”
He said the shop would close on February 27.