Oyster House liquidated, new company formed

Oyster House Media has been liquidated, but its music titles and events will immediately continue through Green Chilli Media, a new company set up by its former MD Hugo Montgomery-Swan.

Oyster House suspended publication of Guitar Buyer earlier this month but other mags in the OHM stable  - Bass Guitar, Acoustic and Drummer will now be published by Swan's new company Green Chilli Media.

The events side of the business is unaffected and its four shows - The London Drum Show, Electric Guitar Show, Bass Show and Acoustic Show - will continue as normal. OHE will be changing its name to Green Chilli Events, however.

In a statement, Hugo Montgomery-Swan, MD of OHM said: "The liquidation of Oyster House Media is truly regrettable but times are extremely tough for everyone and the music sector and all those that serve it are facing many challenges. Nevertheless, we have to look forward and to this end we can confirm that the publishing of Bass Guitar Magazine, Acoustic Magazine and Drummer Magazine, titles owned by Oyster House Events Ltd, will continue.

"Our dedicated team are united in their determination to ensure that these excellent titles will not only remain but push ahead in both print, digital and iTune app formats. A new company, Green Chilli Media Ltd, has been formed and assigned the new publishing contract for the three titles from this point forward. In the meantime, Oyster House Events Ltd, also responsible for our four London Olympia music shows, remains totally unaffected and progress towards the next three shows, including the booking of artists and selling of exhibition space, continues without disturbance. Oyster House Events will, however, change its name to Green Chilli Events in line with the new publishing company."

Montgomery-Swan attributed the firm's difficulties to a number of factors including diminishing revenue streams and debts unearthed following the closure of the Ely office and the Drummer and Guitar Buyer administration passing to the Devon office.

"In a scenario of this type, try as we might, there are going to be people who lose money. But nobody loses more than I do in this situation. This is my business, that my wife and I have struggled and worked hard to build up over the years," he added.

As a result of the reorganisation, there have been six redundancies from the Oyster House team.

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