Miroma, one of the UK’s largest barter exchanges focusing on media trade, is set to acquire night clubs to add to their portfolio of businesses. According to Mad.co.uk, ”
Miroma recently launched Miroma Leisure, a new arm of the business, installing former Chez Gerard restaurant boss Richard Littman as managing director. Boyan bought West End club Bar Rumba and the Maya nightclub in Soho and is now set to go on an aggressive acquisition trail.
“We have the two clubs in London but we’ll probably have another ten or 12 in London by the end of the year,” says Boyan. “We are also looking at properties in New York and Las Vegas but that will come later.”
If that sounds a little overambitious for a company used to dealing in media rather than nightlife, Boyan insists his plan does make sense when viewed in context of how media owners need to spend their money.
“What do we have right now in our inventory? All sorts - TVs, watches, cars, hotel rooms and about $5m or $6m worth of TV, radio and online media space,” he says.
“The key to the whole thing is fuelling our ability to buy media space so we ask ourselves: ‘What is it that media owners want? What are their key costs?’”
One of those key costs that Boyan has identified is corporate hospitality. Boyan lives in New York and flies to London regularly for work. He reveals: “I tend to pay cash but have recently bartered my flights with a transatlantic airline through the clubs because the airline wanted a Christmas party. So I bartered £30,000 worth of flights for a party of that value.”
Owning clubs also means the business has a route to sell any excess drinks that may come from doing deals.”
