Belfast restaurant Buba up for sale after owner’s warning
Belfast restaurant Buba has gone on the market just weeks after its owner warned about the potential impact of bus strikes on city centre trade.
Restaurateur and former Hospitality Ulster chair Tony O’Neill, who also co-owns Italian restaurant Coppi with his wife, had warned that Buba could close for good as a result of lost custom in the run-up to Christmas.
Buba opened in St Anne’s Square in early 2018 as a venue specialising in Mediterranean food but was relaunched as a burger joint in response to rising energy costs and the cost of living crisis.
In December Mr O’Neill he said he was reviewing profits and turnover at the restaurant ahead of the strikes.
“We looked at our results a couple of months back, and this year is the first since Covid that bookings were strong,” Mr O’Neill said.
“Now it feels like the rug has been pulled out from under us again. A lot of us, ourselves included, are questioning things.
“Buba is a smaller restaurant, and if you take two days from it, it makes it too lean to survive.
“We now need to look at the question of if it’s viable to continue putting money into it because it’s becoming difficult to sustain.”
Now the venue is on the market though commercial property practice CBRE NI, which describe it in a brochure as a “very successful and reputable business”. Annual rent is £32,900 while a service charge of nearly £6,000 also applies.
No reason was given for the decision to sell and Buba remains open from Thursday to Saturday every week.
