Scott’s Spot

By Scott Vaughan

Hello all and welcome to the October edition of Scott’s Spot. This month, the spotlight will be on Gumeracha publican, Mark Warren, for an in-depth insight into Mark’s family history and his journey to becoming a publican himself.

REGIONAL MEETINGS

Regionals were back in full swing, starting with another well-supported turnout at the Somerset Hotel in Millicent, followed by another fantastic event at the Kingsford Hotel in Gawler. A massive thanks to both venues for hosting the events, along with all the members and corporate partners who made the days both enjoyable informative.

Great to see the Kosch family together at The Commodore Mount Gambier.

(Top) Beautiful Spring day at the Swan Reach Hotel. (Bottom) Looking back at the Bowhill General Store.

Ben Reusch, manager at the Meningie Hotel with the book “Drinking on the Rivers”, which captures stunning photos and stories of river pubs throughout the state. He’s also sporting an impressive face mask.

Yours truly with the legendary Tim Ferret after finishing the AHA|SA ‘Our Shout’ podcast. Tim’s stories could have filled a couple of hours!

The sun setting on The Woodside Hotel beer garden.

Look closely at the train image above the front bar in the Peterborough Hotel. It’s the largest known mirror of its kind!

Royal Oak Hotel Penola.

Hard Working Couple Rejuvenate the Gumeracha Hotel

Mark Warren didn’t choose a career in hospitality, hospitality chose Mark. His father John Warren had a dream to own a hotel one day and set up a financially sound business to support his family. The dream came true when Mark and his brother were removed from the Solomontown School – Port Pirie. The family sold their corner deli store located in the heart of Port Pirie and were off to Yorketown to the Yorke Hotel.

As individuals we all have role models we look up to, but you don’t often hear about role models for work. Mark’s models were his parents, as both worked hard together whilst bringing up two boys

Mark describes them both as hospitality warriors.

“I remember one year dad fell down the cellar of the hotel and broke his elbow,” he said.

“Dad ended up getting a six-inch screw inserted in his arm, this did not stop him from pouring beers though.

“You don’t think about these things when you’re younger but I remember lying in bed hearing a noise at the front of the hotel around 10pm during a school night.

“When I got up to see what the noise was, I recognised mum on a ladder cleaning the front walls of the hotel.

“As I said hospitality warriors!”

Mark’s dream growing up was to be an AFL footballer and he was progressing well on the field, representing the Woodville Peckers at under 17 level, however a knee reconstruction put an end to his AFL dream.

Once schooling finished, Mark was accepted into Tech Studies Teaching and Graphic Design at University but the feeling wasn’t right, so it was back to Yorketown to concentrate on a hospitality career.

On the advice of his parents, Mark completed a Hospitality Traineeship. This was completed over one year at that time, with Mark working at well known venues such as the Kent Town and Torrens Arms Hotels to name a couple. It was then back to the Yorke Hotel for a few months, before a permanent move down to Adelaide.

After working at a number of venues throughout the late nineties, Mark met his wife to be, Amanda George while working at the Windmill Hotel.

Both Amanda and Mark were well on the way in their careers, with Amanda becoming a gaming manager at the Elizabeth Tavern. Mark progressed to duty manager status then becoming a venue manager at the Rose and Crown which was part of the Taverner group at the time, with Mark managing a number of their venues.

In 2018 and with an abundance of hospitality management behind them, they purchased the Gumeracha Hotel.

During this period from March to July before the doors opened to the public, all the time was spent cleaning, painting and whatever was necessary to have the hotel operational and in working order. There was not a day off over this period, as the premises had been left in a pretty ordinary state

When doors opened for the first time on 10 July 2018, Mark and Amanda were surprised with the community wanting to know ‘who they were and what they are about’. Upon reflection, they realised this was to be expected, knowing the curiosity of locals in small communities.

After finding their feet in the first year, The Cudlee Creek bushfires then tore through the region in December 2019. Seeing the devastation firsthand and the sorrow in people’s eyes from losing all their possessions and homes, was hard to take. Serving these people that had lost everything was extremely difficult but an extremely important obligation and simply what publicans do in times of need.

Then on 23 March 2020, the Prime Minister announced pubs were to be closed from 12pm the next day due to COVID-19. Fortunately, after reading various hospitality

newsletters from America, a plan was immediately put in place with a takeaway menu starting that very night. There were many points within their action plan, ranging from staff to marketing to delivery.

On that note, the plan stated: “Start a delivery program and include handwritten notes thanking people for the business and remind them that calling in directly to place orders rather than using a third party saves your business money.”

This proved extremely successful in gathering support from the surrounding communities, while also providing a service that was required.

This was a tough time in hospitality but some benefits came out of the shut down.

“JobKeeper assistance from the Australian Government meant we were able to keep our staff employed. We were able to use this time to renovate where possible,” the couple explained.

“We painted all downstairs and removed the paint from the front bar tiles that were installed back in the 1960s.”

The other benefit was that Mark and Amanda finally got to sleep in a few hours a day and recoup their energy levels.

Another goal was to have a beer garden completed and this was accomplished by the end of summer.

Although the challenges continue to this day, the Gumeracha continues to trade well and reap the rewards from the hard work and fantastic customer experiences provided by Mark and Amanda.