Venues
Insurance by type of venue
Pubs, bars, nightclubs, clubs, breweries and cellar doors each follow different licence rules, so each is insured a little differently. Pick a venue type to see what's different about insuring it.
01
Choose your venue
01
Pubs, hotels and taverns
Country hotels with accommodation, city taverns and pubs with a bistro or bottle shop can all be quoted through us.
See pubs, hotels and taverns
02
Bars and small bars
In New South Wales, a small bar licence caps the crowd at 120 and allows no poker machines.
See bars and small bars
03
Nightclubs
Nightclubs usually employ crowd controllers, meaning security staff who each hold a state security licence. In Victoria and Western Australia, the usual ratio is two for the first 100 patrons, then another for every 100 after that.
See nightclubs
04
Licensed clubs and RSLs
In New South Wales, a registered club is owned by its members and has a board of up to nine people. Some clubs run poker machines, and some have volunteers serving drinks.
See licensed clubs and RSLs
05
Breweries and distilleries
A brewery or distillery needs an excise manufacturer licence from the federal government before it starts making its drinks. Excise is the federal tax on beer and spirits made here, and you still need a liquor licence to sell what you make.
See breweries and distilleries
06
Winery cellar doors
You pour tastings and sell bottles at the winery. Wine equalisation tax (WET), a 29% tax on wine's wholesale value, can apply to both, even when nothing has been sold wholesale.
See winery cellar doors
02
Questions that differ from venue to venue
Your broker describes the venue in full to insurers before they quote, and venues can differ a lot on each of these.
1
Closing time
Whether you shut at midnight or keep trading until 3am.
2
Security staff
Whether you employ licensed crowd controllers, and how many on a busy night.
3
What you make or store
Brewing tanks, a still, barrels of wine or a cool room stacked with cartons.
4
Who's running it
A sole owner, a company with directors, or a club's board.
03
Running a restaurant or cafe instead?
Restaurants and cafes, and any hospitality business without a liquor licence, are looked after by our colleagues at Grace Insurance.
Questions about venue types
The state and territory liquor licence pages we checked don't list insurance as a requirement. If the lease or one of your licence conditions mentions insurance, keep that clause handy for your broker.
Yes. Licence names, closing times and security rules all change across Australia. The form has a question about where you trade, so the broker knows whose rules to follow.