A CONTROVERSIAL restaurant has gone out of business, just over a year after opening its doors to the public.
The Hooters restaurant, known for its skimpily-dressed waitresses, sparked protests when it opened in the Harbourside in October 2010.
But the Evening Post has learned that the Bristol restaurant has gone into liquidation and a creditors meeting will be held later this month.
The collapse has been triggered by a lack of trade, mounting debts and a long-running legal dispute with another company.
The doors of the business have been closed and 39 full and part-time staff made redundant.
Hooters brand was started in America, built around a concept involving waitresses who wear a uniform of shorts and tight-fitting T-shirts. The Bristol restaurant was a franchise and its closure does not affect any other Hooters venues.
The Harbourside venture, pictured, attracted criticism from feminist groups who tried to stop it getting a licence. There were then complaints about a bikini competition and the serving of a "boob cake" shaped like a pair of naked breasts at a 12-year-old boy's birthday party, prompting an investigation by the city council. The doors shut for the final time on Monday.
Simon Thornton, from liquidators Houghton Stone Business Recovery, said: "On Monday, a board meeting of Gallus Management Company, decided that Hooters in Bristol should cease to trade with immediate effect, and instructed HSBR to convene a meeting of creditors to place the company into liquidation."
"The company director, Bill McTaggart, considered that one of the main reasons for the failure to achieve sufficient trade was the location of the restaurant in a relatively quiet part of the city centre."
Mr McTaggart was not available for comment yesterday.
The restaurant in Millennium Promenade is the latest business in the area to shut, following a Marks & Spencer supermarket on the same site and another restaurant, Carpe Diem.
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