Watch: Insider's Business Briefing - 6th June 2025 - video Dailymotion

Jennifer and Stephen discuss planning permission for a bowling alley, US expansion for a bed manufacturer and the acquisition of a Scottish hotel.

Transcript

00:00Planning permission of a bowling alley, US expansion for a bed manufacturer and the

00:05acquisition of a Scottish hotel, featuring today's business briefing.

00:10Good morning Joan, what have you seen in the news today?

00:16Good morning Steve-o.

00:17Well starting off today in Northern Ireland, full planning permission has been granted

00:21to Lotus Property for a 23,000 square foot, 21 lane bowling alley and family entertainment

00:27centre at the Boulevard in Banbridge. The decision will see Hollywood Bowl open its second location

00:33in Northern Ireland in early 2026, with work due to start on the site straight away. The

00:39permission initiates a £9 million transformation of the Western part of the scheme, with landlord

00:44investment to create a food and entertainment quarter spanning 60,000 square foot.

00:48That sounds good. Well sticking with the leisure industry, we've got the news that Spinners

00:54has raised £4 million from Gresham House Ventures to launch a series of new venues. The company's

01:00sites offer a range of bowling, crazy golf, darts, shuffleboard, virtual clay pigeon shooting,

01:07alongside food and drink as you'd expect. It opened its first site in Reading in 2021,

01:12it's gone on to expand to sites in Plymouth and Sully Hole. With the new funding it now plans to

01:18launch several new sites across the UK over the next few years. They recently appointed Cushman

01:24and Wakefield as a property agent to help it find new sites. Spinners has also recently invested

01:30in its activities across its venues, that includes the new clay pigeon shooting simulator and there are

01:35plans for a new golf game at future locations. Gresham House said that Spinners has huge potential

01:42for continued expansion, so it's definitely a company to keep an eye on there. Brilliant. Great. Well,

01:47some manufacturing news then. This spring, which is the iconic British manufacturer of handcrafted

01:53luxury mattresses, is accelerating expansion of its US retail presence this year. So the company will

01:59launch 17 new sites across the country as it celebrates rare growth success in the US despite

02:05recent tariff changes. As part of its strategic growth plan, the brand will open 60 solar stores

02:11and these will be complemented by a number of shop and shop locations in partnership with leading

02:16retailers. This spring says it plans to grow by at least 50% in 2025. Oh, brilliant news. Yeah.

02:23Well, a last story for us today. We've got the news that Caledonian Leisure has acquired a historic

02:27hotel in the Scottish town of Calendare, which is known as the gateway to the Highlands. I was actually

02:32up there myself, as you're well aware, a couple of weeks ago. So yeah, really beautiful part of the world,

02:37I can attest to that. Yeah. Well, the company has acquired the 63 bedroom Dreadnought Hotel,

02:42which is set to be rebranded as the Caledonian Thistle Hotel following the purchase. Caledonian also

02:47plans a significant investment programme to improve both the outside and inside of the hotel. That's

02:53going to include upgraded bedrooms and improvements to the communal and entertainment facilities. The 16 bar

03:01at the hotel is going to remain open to the general public and the restaurant there will be rebranded as

03:05the Dreadnought restaurant in honour of the previous name. It's actually a part of a series of

03:10investments for Caledonian Leisure. The company also recently invested 2.4 million in 10 new coaches

03:16to add to its fleet, which now stands at 85 vehicles. So yeah, an exciting time for that business.

03:21Brilliant. Well, if you'd like to hear more on that story and the other stories that we covered today,

03:26you can head on over to insidermedia.com where you can also hear about our upcoming events

03:30and sign up to our newsletters. Thank you.