Opening a new bar is hard enough, but amid a global pandemic, it's a big challenge.
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COVID-19 did little to deter hospitality professionals Shaun Spencer, Matt Goss and Sarah Goss from undertaking the task - with the Sports Garden Hotel opening Friday.
"We stepped into the bar and had a look at it during January," Mr Goss said.
"They started renovating it at the end of last year. We looked around at the few walls that were left here, and it's been about a 10-month process until now.
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"It was a bit of a struggle with getting supplies down and sent over, and finding staff to work on the building," Mr Spencer said.
"I moved here from Melbourne in November, so I was thinking a lot about the venues over there and how they were faring and may not open up again, so we were lucky."
"We've definitely had some luck with the situation we are in now," Mr Goss added.
"If we'd opened in February and then got shut down because of COVID-19 it'd be a completely different story.
"We had more time to focus on what we were going to do and put it all together."
The venue includes a sports bar and casual dining area inside, and an enclosed beer garden outside with a children's entertainment area and room for acoustic music. The hotel rooms upstairs are still under construction.
"It's somewhere people can go and sit outside and have a great meal, our food is one of our focal points," Ms Goss said.
"We have a variety of beers as well as Tasmanian whiskies and gins, and just a nice safe environment."
"It's great for people with families," Mr Goss added.
"We've got a big outdoor beer garden where kids can't run near the road.
"There's plenty of beer gardens around, but there isn't one that is enclosed where you can sit and watch the sport, have a safe place for your family. If it rains you're undercover, and we can put the heaters on in summer if need be.
"We want to cater for the broader community.
"Our chef has done an amazing job with different types of hot dogs, as well as a lot of different types of small plates and share foods.
"We'll have healthier options like super salads and salmon, as well as things like share boxes for groups of people with different offerings so you can try a bit of everything for a group. It's quite casual dining, with your typical pub food, but we wanted our chefs to have fun and enjoy what they put out."
The sports bar opens Friday at 5pm, just in time for a big weekend in sport.
"We were hoping to open for AFL grand final weekend in September, but that stretched out," Mr Spencer said.
"When we looked at everything we needed to do, including COVID business plans, it all centered on this weekend.
"There's the Cox Plate, there's the AFL grand final Saturday night and then there's the NRL. With all that together we thought it'd be the perfect launch weekend.
"We open Friday and can give people a taste of what we've got, and then everything all kicks off. If you're going to open a sports bar as big as this, there's no better weekend to do it."
Sports Garden Hotel is located at 23 George Street Launceston and opens 11am-late Tuesday to Sunday.
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