The inland surfing facility is still closed as the row over who owns it becomes acrimonious
12:11, 30 Jun 2025Updated 13:30, 30 Jun 2025
The UK Adaptive Surf team at The Wave in Easter Compton, Bristol(Image: Image Cabin)
The future of The Wave Bristol, the inland surfing lake near Cribbs Causeway, remains uncertain as the messy row over its ownership, debt, administration and management descended into acrimony and the involvement of the police, over the weekend.
The Bristol site has now been sold by the administrators, who Bristol Live revealed last week had been called in by one of its major shareholders back in April.
But the site remains closed for the time being, and an apparent plan to reopen it on Saturday collapsed late on Friday night.
The Wave now appears to be owned by a new company called Surf Bristol Limited, with a new group of investors taking over the site.
They have named Julian Topham as its interim chief executive during what they call a ‘transition period’.
Mr Topham is the man who founded and runs the Boardmasters surf and music festival in Cornwall, and another company called Vision Nine.
Mr Topham, who is also the chairman of Surfing England and the Blue Earth Summit, asked for patience while this new team get together to reopen The Wave.
“I have known about The Wave since it was just an idea, and have surfed it many times since it opened in 2019,” he said.
“I have worked in the surf industry for 25+ years and in my view The Wave is an extremely important part of the UK surf community and has the ability to grow and support a diverse and inclusive surfing community.
“I want to ensure it stays that way, and thrives, for the long term.
“We appreciate there has been huge uncertainty in the last week, for so many people, especially our wonderful Wavemaker staff, customers, and partners, so a big thank you for your understanding.
“There will be a short period of transition as a company changes hands and we get up to speed, but we are doing everything we can to make this as smooth and as fast as possible, and get The Wave open again.”
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The sudden sale on Friday, which came after The Wave suddenly closed on Thursday (June 26) last week, appears to have scuppered the plans the previous majority shareholder said it had to reopen The Wave on Saturday, so now the 200 staff who work there still face an uncertain future.
The Wave’s website, which was essentially closed down on Thursday, did reopen over the weekend, but bookings are ‘paused’ on the site, and customers redirected to Mr Topham’s statement.
The Wave at Easter Compton has attracted thousands of surfers since it opened in 2019(Image: Nick Hounsfield)
The complex web of companies and shareholdings that were running the site and employing the staff, and were struggling to pay off the estimated £15 million are now split acrimoniously, with one accusing the other of deliberately ‘undermining’ their efforts to refinance the business and reopen it sooner rather than later.
The business which owned and managed the site was called The Wave Group, which went into administration back in April, a move which saw the man who founded and ran the project – Nick Hounsfield – forced out.
Its majority shareholder was a London-based investment firm called Sullivan Street Partners, which had taken on a large share of the millions of debt it took to build The Wave itself and get it through Covid.
Sullivan Street Partners said it had invested and grown the business over the past three years, but when a minority shareholder, called JAR Wave, went into administration, it took The Wave Group with it.
Since then, administrators have been involved in restructuring the company, overseeing the departure of Mr Hounsfield and saying they are offering the site up for sale. Things came to a head late last week.
On Thursday, the administrators closed down The Wave giving staff no warning, and said the site had gone into ‘technical insolvency’.
READ MORE: Bristol’s The Wave is expanding with more locations set to open across UK soonREAD MORE: The Wave closes suddenly as surf facility battles debt and administration
At the same time, Sullivan Street Partners said they were working on a refinancing deal of their own, which would have taken The Wave back out of administration and got it reopened.
Sullivan Street Partners said on Friday they had been close to sorting that out, so that The Wave would be able to reopen on Saturday, only to discover that the administrators BTG had sold The Wave from under them to a new consortium.
“These actions have unnecessarily removed the business from the staff and majority shareholder Sullivan Street Partners, which have built and grown the park over the last three years,” a spokesperson for Sullivan Street Partners said.
“A previous minority shareholder and individuals associated with the shareholder chose to pursue personal returns, significantly acting out of step with their moral and fiduciary duties,” they alleged.
“The sequence of events, in immediate hindsight, now appears to have been long planned to undermine all efforts to deliver a full refinance in an orderly fashion.
“Instead, issues have been raised over the past month and over the last several hours, specifically aimed at achieving the goal of grabbing the business at an undervalue and prejudicing other creditors in the process,” they claimed.
Nick Hounsfield, the founder of The Wave
According to Sullivan Street Partners, they still own ‘The Wave’ name, so if or whenever the surfing park does reopen, the new owners won’t be able to call it ‘The Wave’.
Sullivan Street Partners also said they have called the police after they were the victim of a cyber attack at the same time all this was going on.
Sullivan Street Partners allege assets associated with The Wave park have been ‘appropriated illegally with systems being hacked and frozen’.
“We have simultaneously been the victim of a cyber attack with all data having been stolen – this may or may not be connected to the other assaults on the company,” a spokesperson said.
“The latter has also meant customers could not be contacted to make them aware of the potential compromise to their data. The police have been informed,” they added.
Sullivan Street Partners claimed that at 5.57pm on Friday, Jun 27, they were ready to announce the reopening of The Wave the next day, Saturday, only to discover that the site had been sold, so reopening it was ‘no longer possible’.
Sullivan Street Partners had been the London investment firm that Nick Hounsfield brought in to expand The Wave to other locations around the country, including one in London itself.
The investment company said it still planned to do that, under The Wave brand.
“The Wave Group remains on track to open an amazing site in London in 2027 and has several other opportunities under development,” a spokesperson said.
“Whilst this is very disappointing to see a site we have built brick by brick over the last ten years face this disruption, we are mostly sorry for the upset the actions of others have caused for Wavemakers and clients of The Wave.
“We march on and are determined to continue our mission to deliver an exciting inland surf experience for all,” it added.
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