Mr and Mrs Jones have sold the popular South Dunedin pub and will be pouring their final drinks on Saturday night, before a stocktake on Sunday, and then heading to their Arrowtown house on Monday.
The couple has spent 35 years each in the hospitality industry and their move to Dunedin was initially meant to be for five years. But five turned into 14.
While they had not yet made plans for what they would do in Arrowtown, they would not be returning to the hospitality industry. It was time out, rather than retirement, they said.
The couple ran the New Orleans Hotel in Arrowtown for 20 years before Mr Jones — keen to get out of the industry — spent a year in real estate. But he decided it was not his "cup of tea" and they decided to move to Dunedin where they had children living.
The plan was to buy a pub, spend five years there and return to Arrowtown. At the time, the hotel was part of the Robbie’s franchise which later disbanded after 10 years.
Mr and Mrs Jones then renamed it the Rope & Twine, a nod to the nearby Donaghy’s rope factory as they wanted to link the establishment to some local industry. The hotel was originally established as the Ocean View Hotel in 1875 and, a year later, John Donaghy started the rope-making factory.
The years in Dunedin had been good; the couple had met "a lot of really good people" and got involved in the community. Business was going well and, while Covid-19 was hard, they had come out of it pretty well as the business tended to serve the local community, rather than tourists.
When they first arrived, customers were mostly from South Dunedin but they now also drew patrons from throughout the city.
The new owners were from Wellington and they were taking on all the existing staff so it would be business as usual as far as patrons were concerned, they said.
Asked what they would miss, Mr Jones said it would be the people — they had a lot of regulars — while staff had also become like family and it was sad to be leaving that.
Mrs Jones said the secret to running a successful pub was being hands-on while her husband said it was important to have the ability to talk to people and cater to their needs. His wife quipped that she sometimes needed to be a marriage guidance counsellor and a psychologist.
Hospitality was all-consuming and the couple worked together "24/7".
"It’s a young person’s game these days," Mrs Jones said.
"We just knew, after 35 years, we feel it’s time for somebody with fresh blood and new ideas," Mr Jones added.
Mrs Jones was looking forward to being able to watch a bit more of Coronation Street, although she did manage to sneak away at times to see it.
They were also happy to come back to the pub to fill in, if the new management was short staffed, and they hoped the community would continue to support the business.
They had seen many changes in the hospitality industry over the years, including increased "red tape", increased focus on drink-driving and the current increase in prices.
For a publican, Mrs Jones said she did not drink much while Mr Jones enjoyed socialising with customers — "they like it when I come out and have a yarn".
But after 14 years of living out of a suitcase, he was looking forward to moving back to their Arrowtown home which they had kept since moving away.
