{"id":131584,"date":"2025-11-12T18:35:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-12T18:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/131584\/"},"modified":"2025-11-12T18:35:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T18:35:08","slug":"owners-close-tararuas-historic-wimbledon-tavern-to-evil-locals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/131584\/","title":{"rendered":"Owners close Tararua\u2019s historic Wimbledon Tavern to \u2018evil\u2019 locals"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gathercole said there was nothing more he could do to keep the doors of the building, which is listed as a Category 2 Historic Place by Heritage New Zealand, open to the public and those living locally. <\/p>\n

\u201c[We] will only entertain groups of people that prebook at least two months in advance to allow special licences to be applied for and granted.\u201d<\/p>\n

He had been working fulltime in Hastings and said he had spent an estimated $200,000 in the last seven years on the building and business, which, in recent times, had only brought in an income of less than $300 a week.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe historic Wimbledon Tavern once saw people stopping by to have a drink and meal.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe quite like living rurally, we quite like the isolation … we quite like being there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not just f***** Aucklanders.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my house… if I won Lotto tomorrow I\u2019d put it on a truck and take it somewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said they announced the closure to the community by slipping notes into fish and chip orders that said it would be official on October 31.<\/p>\n

No one responded to the notes, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe community turned against us.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no empathy that exists in the district – all that exists is evil.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said increasing costs and a lack of turnover in recent years led them to host the annual meeting for the Mongrel Mob\u2019s Barbarians<\/a> Dannevirke Chapter on December 16, 2023. <\/p>\n

He then claimed the backlash to that decision led to the business description of the Wimbledon Tavern being changed on Google to say they were \u2018permanently closed\u2019. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think you realise the pressure we have been under in the last two years, it has been unbelievably stressful, and I can\u2019t see beyond that.\u201d <\/p>\n

Gathercole said he was grateful for the eight to 10 locals who had supported the pub.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople haven\u2019t got the money these days.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf that core group, probably six of them come to the pub once a week, and spend just under $100 each – it just doesn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know we were doing the right thing. People from outside of the district came along and were amazed at our food and our hosting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tararua North Ward councillor Erana Peeti Webber said the Wimbledon community was a close-knit one and people cared about each other, but didn\u2019t have a lot of money.<\/p>\n

\u201cTimes are pretty tough at the moment in all the communities, really, and such a small area where they are.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t help with the Herbertville pub all done up, and it\u2019s probably the new thing. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey all normally support each other, but obviously something has happened out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peeti-Webber said new mayor Scott Gilmore was looking at reviving a \u2018love local\u2019 campaign to help hospitality businesses in the district. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gathercole said there was nothing more he could do to keep the doors of the building, which is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":131585,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[665,651,5201,1259,6741,29480,6628,794,29137,20829,1362,111,43,139,69,5493,9769,2687,90585,78030,61,90587,90586,102],"class_list":["post-131584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-around","tag-close","tag-closed","tag-community","tag-doors","tag-evil","tag-historic","tag-isolated","tag-keeping","tag-locals","tag-made","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-open","tag-owners","tag-saying","tag-tararuas","tag-tavern","tag-to","tag-unviable","tag-wimbledon","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}