“We’ve changed thecarpets and all the rooms are getting renovated,” he said.
“Jeremy Rogers, who was the general manager at The Grand for 20 years, I hired him again last week.
“We gave the Irish Bar to someone else to run but now I’m taking it back. There will be a couple more good chefs and Jeremy will run the operation as it used to be.”
Whanganui district councillor Ross Fallen earlier this year expressed concerns on social media about the state of the outside of the hotel.
He told the Chronicle he had since been “swamped” by other concerns from members of the community - at a time when accommodation was hard to find during large events like Whanganui Vintage Weekend and the New Zealand Masters Games.
The hotel has also been attracting one-star reviews.
The hotel, built in 1927, has a 3.5-star rating on Tripadvisor but reviews from 2023 were predominantly one-star.
Whanganui district councillor Ross Fallen. Photo / Bevan Conley
Sheryl Gleeson told the Chronicle she travelled to Whanganui from Waikato with a group of 10 every year and always stayed at The Grand.
“This is a standing booking for five rooms, rebooked before we leave each year and reconfirmed three months out,” she said.
“When I rang on September 27 [2023], they told me they could not confirm my booking as their computer was down but would ring me back. They never rang me back.”
She said she called four times last October and got no reply but the following month the rooms were confirmed.
“We arrived in the morning and they had no record of our booking and no record of my calls.”
Eventually, the group stayed at Lakelands Holiday Park at Lake Wiritoa.
Kumar said he was sure Rogers would get things running smoothly again, including the booking system.
“We are thinking about starting small, maybe with breakfast again when Jeremy comes back. I’ll leave it with him. I said ‘You do your own plans about how you want to run The Grand’.”
People could not see the tough time he had gone through in the last few years, Kumar said.
“They just say ‘This is no good, that is no good’ but a lot of businesses went into liquidation and some lost their houses. There is still a recession going on New Zealand-wide.
“Interest rates used to be at 4 per cent and they’re now getting up to 10 per cent.”
He said he had no plans to sell the business and he had briefly spoken to Fallen.
“Ross was very grumpy on Facebook. I rang him and explained everything - ‘Come into my shoes and see how you feel’.”
“We are exploring that officially but it takes a very long time. You‘re not going to see a hotel opening here before 2029,” Fallen said.
“Most older people want a hotel within walking distance of the CBD - quick access - and The Grand is an obvious choice.”
Mike Tweed is an assistant news director and multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.
