The Hunterville locals who bought their pub

The historic Argyle Hotel in Hunterville sat in disrepair for two years, so when it came up for sale, a group of locals banded together.

The pub had long been part of the fabric of the central North Island town. Established in 1885 it burned down twice and after the second fire in 1947, was rebuilt in its current Art Deco style.

Two weeks ago, the Argyle Hotel at 1 Bruce St, on the corner of Highway 1 reopened, serving beer and food again after local man, Hamish Cavanagh, kicked off the idea to bring it back to life.

“We've got a pretty strong community, a very strong community, and it was just sitting there going backwards, and it went up for auction," Cavanagh told RNZ’s Nine to Noon.

"I put out a bit of a blanket email to everyone I knew, and had a few yarns to people about it, and they said well if we get it cheap enough, yeah we'll do something,” Cavanagh says.

Fifty families came on board as investors and on 1 August, 2024 the group bought the Argyle Hotel. They held a meeting at the local rugby club and elected Cavanagh as their chairman then spent 12 months doing it up.

The building cost $260,000 and a further $500,000 was spent on renovations, although they’ve kept costs down thanks to an army of volunteers.

“We just got stuck in and did the whole thing, just pretty much gutted it, took all the bedrooms out, and that's where the retail shops are.

"We've fully redone the kitchen, and the restaurant, pulled up all the old carpet, got back to the native boards, and sanded them back and varnished them, which have come up amazing, and yeah like I say gutted it and redone it, put a massive deck out and new bars.”

There’s plenty of business nous in the community which helped drive the project along, he said. Many of the directors run their own farms and rural businesses.

“We've had obstacles, and it's taken longer than we thought, with consents and change of use of the building… many, many hours spent in meetings, working it out, and getting the budgets, and getting it all right, and then also the working bees, the volunteers, the shareholders coming in.”

The revamped pub now has a cafe, a garden bar and eatery, as well as three retail spaces - Wool & Comb hairdressers, Salt & Honey clothing store and Hunterville Village Gifts, a gift and bookshop. Plus a campervan park out the back.

The revamped Argyle Hotel opened on 10 October and is off to a brisk start, Cavanagh said.

“There's been a lot of people stopping, a lot of out-of-towners, and obviously the locals are supporting it, and all the shareholders.

"It's been really great, it's hit the ground running, and there's hardly been a quiet day.”