'I've lost £250K and I've not paid myself for two years'

Sacha Barnes says he has lost almost £250,000 since he launched La Perla in Leicester Street four years ago and with no realistic prospect of being able to turn things around he is a matter of days away from closing his doors for good.

Sharon Brown has run The Grapes pub in nearby Market Place for 14 years but she says it is almost impossible to keep up with soaring bills and a large fall in customers since people were locked down at home due to coronavirus.

Both are also unhappy about millions of pounds of investment being spent on establishing a food and drink hub at The Stockyard, at the town’s livestock market site, because they say it will attract valuable potential customers away from struggling town centre hospitality businesses.

Sacha said: “Business rates have shot up extortionately and they are just too high to survive – ours have gone up £360 a month in the last year.

“There’s been a few local businesses which have already recently closed because of the rates and a few more are about to do so soon.

"We are down about 65 per cent in business since Covid because there are a lot less people dining out.

"The majority of people - about 95 per cent - are paying on credit cards now – and hardly anyone tips anymore because they can’t afford it.”

Sacha says it is soul-destroying after putting so much time and effort into his business.

He spent £38,000 on the bar area alone and invested heavily into making it a destination restaurant, which has won countywide awards.

“Basically I’ve lost about £247,000 since I started La Perla,” explained Sacha.

“During lockdown I easily lost £100,000 and although we were given grants it came nowhere near covering my monthly rent payments.

“There is no chance of recovering a single penny - I haven’t paid myself for two years.

“I’ve been constantly topping up from my own personal account but it has got to the stage where I’m going to have close down in the next couple of weeks.”

Sacha pointed out how difficult it is to run businesses profitably, with the need to pay £206 a month for a licence if he wants to play background music for diners.

He says Melton Borough Council should be doing more to attract more people into the town in the evening to boost businesses involved in the night time economy.

Sacha added: “I’ve been living here all my life.

"I went to St Francis Primary School and my father used to have a shipping company in the town.

"I’ve tried my hardest to do my best for Melton but I feel like I’ve just been stabbed in the back.”

Sharon says that soaring rates and energy bills, falling footfall since the pandemic and a lack of investment in the town centre has led her to seriously consider selling up at The Grapes and moving away in the near future.

She has gone from paying no business rates due to getting rate relief on a smaller property to having to pay £12,500 a year.

“Before Covid we could just about pay that but now you have 50 per cent less takings or less than that and it’s a real struggle,” explained Sharon.

"Because of the cost of living crisis people are spending less in shops, pubs and restaurants and they can’t get a taxi home at night because there are fewer drivers working at night now.

“I used to have a lot of elderly customers get the bus in from the villages and a few from Nottingham but now they’ve stopped those buses they can’t get into Melton anymore.

"Then you’ve got your energy bills going up by so much – my electric bill has more than doubled recently.

"This is the worst time I’ve ever known in the pub business.

“We’ve put our small holding up for sale and we will be moving out the area.”

Sharon says she has emailed local councillors to see if there is anything further the borough council can do to support town businesses like hers but she has had little success.

"That development at the cattle market is the final nail in the coffin for many of us to be honest,” she continued.

“They want to invest millions of pounds into that to make it an event centre with food and drink and the town just isn’t going to survive.

“It’s at the other end of town, the parking, food and drink will be up there, so why would they bother walking back into town to use pubs and restaurants in the centre?”

With everything going up in price, Sharon is concerned about the future of the pub trade in Melton.

She said: “The cost of buying the beer goes up every year and Guinness has gone up three times this year.

“Carbon dioxide has tripled in price this year and you need it because you can’t pull your beer without it.”

Sharon has organised regular public events in the town, such as the monthly vintage craft markets, in a bid to get more people in the centre.

She added: “The car parking prices are too high and we get fewer coaches now for the public events and the market.

"We need the town to be much busier to give us businesses a chance of surviving.”