The East Lancashire Masonic Hall Company

The Company is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Charity and has prime responsibility for the running of Freemasons Hall, Manchester. The Company has two main sources of income, those being Masonic business and non-Masonic business. The Masonic business comes from the hosting of Craft Lodges, Royal Arch Chapters and various side Degrees, as well as associated dinners, lunches and ancillary social functions. The non-Masonic business consists of hiring out parts of Freemasons’ Hall with or without associated catering services to non-Masonic organisations and individuals. This would include such events as breakfast meetings, training sessions, conferences, weddings and various social functions.  Freemasons Hall has also been used on numerous occasions by television production companies for the making of television programmes.

The Masonic and non-Masonic business fit well as the vast majority, but not all, of the Masonic business is weekdays in the evening and the vast majority of the non-Masonic business is weekdays during the day and at weekends, particularly for weddings, engagements and social functions. Although along with every other business in the events venue business, the company has experienced difficult trading conditions it is felt that the company more than held its own during the last year or two and in fact in a difficult climate it is hard to see how it could have fared better. Going forward with the sale of Freemasons’ Hall, the details of which have been communicated to all concerned, the future of the Hall Company is likely to be short lived as the Hall Company will cease trading when the purchasers take possession of the premises to begin their refurbishment plans, probably in April 2012.

At this stage it is envisaged that on the reopening of the building, in or around November 2012, when Freemasonry will be held exclusively on the third floor of the building, all dining and business activities currently run by the Hall Company will have been transferred to the new owners of the building and therefore, there will be no need for the Hall Company to exist.

As to the organisation of Freemasonry on the third floor;  it is likely that this will be carried out through a stand alone non profit making organisation that will basically be owned and run by Manchester Freemasons and will not be a subsidiary of the Charity.

The Hall Company is fortunate to be able to call on the services of an excellent and loyal group of employees, headed by Hans Riedlesperger the General Manager, who is ably assisted by all of his extremely hard working staff who are able to provide premises, services and catering to the highest of standards. In these difficult trading times they ensure that the Company obtains it fair share of what is at the moment a vastly reduced market.

 

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