Kevin McMahon of Ranelagh’s Wild Goose Grill says when a one-time offer came to buy out the lease on his smart neighbourhood restaurant, business logic dictated only one outcome. “We’ve had a great 17 years, but it’s very difficult to envisage making a profit in the next year or two. It was an inevitable moment brought forward by the building changeover.”
The decision came about after the building on Sandford Road, where the popular restaurant has an upstairs premises, was sold last year. The new owner, Grand Slam Bars, a consortium led by publican Noel Anderson and former Irish rugby internationals Rob Kearney, Dave Kearney, Jamie Heaslip and Sean O’Brien, bought the premises (including McSorley’s Pub at ground level) for €5.5 million.
Handing over to Anderson and the team on good terms, McMahon says this is a sign of the times for smart dining restaurants which have become unaffordable in the current climate. “The dining out market is becoming too expensive at our level. When I saw main courses move into the €40-plus level, that was a big eye-opener. We can see them move to €50 pretty quickly. The shift is towards casual affordable dining, or very high end fine dining.”
Grand Slam Bars plan to revamp the upstairs restaurant and make it into a seven-days-a-week food, drinks and events space. McMahon sees the logic: “The idea of bringing a large group out to a restaurant for a celebration is too expensive now, but you can take a large room in a pub, put on finger food and cocktails and put a few grand behind the bar – that makes sense.”
‘Remote working has had such an impact there’s little onus to return even occasionally. People can run their businesses from these second homes for long periods’
McMahon opened the Wild Goose in 2008 after departing Ely Wine Bar. The 90-seater restaurant quickly garnered a loyal following for its high quality fare under chef Ionut Bogdan Rosoiu, and its extensive 300-bottle wine list was among the best in the city. Once the go-to diningroom for well-heeled denizens of Dublin 6, in recent years the area has seen an influx of more informal quality restaurants including Host, Gigi’s, Nightmarket, The Butcher Grill and more recently Mexican Suertudo replacing Dilingers.
[ ‘We tried everything’: Ranelagh’s Exchequer Wine Bar announces sudden closureOpens in new window ]
McMahon says the demographic of the suburb has changed substantially. “When we started there were lots of people in their 50s and above, with a bit of money, no mortgage, kids grown up who were happy to dine out midweek. Now we’re seeing a lot of young families with big mortgages who will only ever dine out on the weekend.”
Changing living and working patterns have also had an impact. “Ranelagh is a wonderful village but a lot of older residents who would be our customers decamp for a very long summer to Portugal, Spain and the west of Ireland. Remote working has had such an impact there’s little onus to return even occasionally. People can run their businesses from these second homes for long periods.”
‘I think the utility companies have got away with murder in their pursuit of small businesses while the Government has done little to intervene’
The impact of Covid and overhanging warehoused debt has been a contributing factor in the closure of many restaurants recently, but McMahon says they were lucky in that they remained solvent throughout. “Bills have skyrocketed since Ukraine war began, and I think the utility companies have got away with murder in their pursuit of small businesses while the Government has done little to intervene. There was a rebate at one point, but it was little use after allowing the utilities to rob us in the first place.”
Another tipping point was the Rugby World Cup in 2023 when thousands of Irish travelled to France for a series of matches. The impact on Ranelagh was significant: “So much money left the city for all of those weekends, and when they came back they were tired and broke. That had a huge and unexpected effect on the business.”
McMahon says the decision to close now makes sense. “We were at a crossroads where we had to put money back into the business. Last time we had done so was when we opened in 2008 and invested our life savings. We made that money back quickly. But to invest heavily now, given my age and diminished profit margins the timeline to get a return could be 15 years with no guarantee you’d ever see the money again.”
McMahon says he will take a short break after March and while he has ideas there are no immediate plans. The Wild Goose was originally envisaged as a casual dining wine bar when it first opened, but when they needed to put linen tablecloths over worn pine tables it suddenly made the restaurant much smarter and they quickly had to pivot to full a la carte dining. Any new venture will likely revert to a casual model. “My logic would be to flip the drink to food ratio. Where we currently do about 70 per cent food, 30 per cent bar, the preference would be 70 per cent bar. Something like a wine bar, where you have less labour, less waste.”
The closure of the Wild Goose follows closely on the heels of the closure last month of another popular Ranelagh local, The Exchequer Wine bar. Owner Peter Rock reluctantly decided to close its doors after 17 years, unable to keep up with post-pandemic warehoused tax debt and soaring costs of wages, utilities and food.
The Wild Goose will remain open to March 29th, and vouchers can be redeemed up to that date.
