One of the most notable Cheltenham hotels, the historically located The George Hotel shut down recently shut down on the 12th of July, 2018, a Tuesday, following its acquisition by new owners. The transaction was made due to the redundancies made at the hotel, located on St. George’s Road, which was put on the market for £3.6 million on November of 2017 by Cotswolds Inns and Hotels.
According to reports, the staff were brought together a day before the closing in order to make positions redundant or to be given of new positions in the business.
It’s unclear who was the company that managed to buy out the property, but most reports point to The Lucky Onion group, a firm known for owning several boutique hotels, cosy pubs and restaurants located across the Cotswolds including No. 131 and No. 38 The Park, as the organisation with the winning bid.
Reports say that there’s some buzz coming from The Lucky Onion group that it was their bid that won one of the most notable Cheltenham hotels in the city. The vagueness and lack of clear facts covering the sale was reported to have been problematic for the staff, who were being treated improperly over the sale and left uninformed.
The George Hotel is one of the three-AA-star Cheltenham hotels, made up of five converted townhouses merged together with a space of 31 bedrooms, originally built in 1840 on the western half of CheltenhamTop of Form. The hotel’s sale was handled by the property firm Christie & Co. on behalf of the property’s owners, Michael and Pamela Horton.
A statement from a spokesperson for the hotel confirmed the sale of the hotel, to close off on the 12th with the sale finishing up by the end of the week. The new owners, which the spokesperson refused to name, will reportedly will be working on refurbishment.
The spokesperson clarified, saying that anyone with bookings to the hotel have already been notified, with staff either being made redundant or getting positions at other sites in the Cotswolds.
The hotel first went up with the price tag of £3.6m, before being slashed by £350,000 in March of 2018 due to difficulties with sale.