The Shankly Hotel has been put up for sale after the Signature Living venue fell into administration last year.
Signature Living's hotel - one of the city's most well known and a tribute to LFC great Bill Shankly - is now on the market after the pandemic caused difficulties for the UK's hospitality operators including Lawrence Kenwright's firm.
Signature Shankly Ltd - the firm holding the leasehold interest of the Victoria Street building fell into administration last year as it and other Signature Living businesses struggled to cope with the effects of Covid.
Real estate firm CBRE has announced the sale on behalf of administrators, Kroll, just months after it appeared on BBC documentary The Grand Party Hotel back in September.
A spokesman for Signature Living said the Shankly Hotel’s current and future guests, as well as its suppliers and staff are not affected by the news - nor by the marketing of the hotel for sale.
The 125-bedroom Shankly Hotel is a large seven-storey building on an island site fronting Victoria Street, Whitechapel and Crosshall in Liverpool city centre.
Shaun Skidmore, senior director for operational real estate at CBRE Manchester said: "We are delighted to bring to market The Shankly Hotel at a time when the UK staycation market remains buoyant. Liverpool is the sixth most visited city in the UK with a strong performing hotel market, which benefits from a good mix of commercial and leisure demand.
"There is pent up demand for this kind of hotel which can accommodate groups of people keen to unite when restrictions allow.
"While post-Covid domestic holidays continue to appeal to travellers, we expect the UK outlook in 2021 to remain strong with CBRE expecting the hotel sector to fully recover by 2024. As such The Shankly Hotel represents an excellent opportunity for a keen investor to acquire a consistently high performing hotel with a national profile and a range of additional revenue streams and further development potential."
Following its phased opening between 2015 to 2019, CBRE said the hotel "surpassed trading expectations" by capitalising on group booking packages - and has "consistently beaten Liverpool’s average hotel performance KPI’s over the last three years".
One of Liverpool's best known hotels, it fell into administration in April 2020, however reopened as the various lockdowns over the past year eased.
CBRE is handling the sale of the iconic hotel on behalf of joint administrators Matthew Ingram and Michael Lennon of Kroll - formerly Duff & Phelps Ltd - which was appointed last year.
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Mr Lennon added: “The Signature Shankly hotel is a quality venue, in an excellent location. Pre-pandemic, it would see around 700 people check in on a Friday night for a weekend experience and its unique offering to larger groups makes it a popular selection.
"During the last 12 months, trading under the various pandemic restrictions has been strong, with a high number of bookings and demand for tickets to events the hotel has been able to host, in excess of the numbers allowed under the COVID reduced capacity. Everyone is confident that the hotel will return to pre-COVID levels of trade once the restrictions are lifted.”
A statement from Lawrence Kenwright released after the announcement said: “As of last Monday it is, at long last, business as usual and our team is back to doing what it does best, namely giving all our guests the best possible Liverpool welcome.
"For complete clarity, the Shankly Hotel’s current and future guests, as well as its suppliers and staff are not affected by this development, nor by the marketing of the hotel for sale. The administration relates to the bricks and mortar and not to operations.
"We remain in positive and regular contact with our first charge lenders, our investors and the administrators regarding a Company Voluntary Arrangement process which is now well underway.
"The CVA process has the support of more than 95% of our unsecured creditors and would see us coming out of administration and re-acquiring the sites which have been affected by it.”
