A NEW cat café coming to Halstead has had to push back its opening date after issues impacting the building were discovered.
Town resident Rebecca White is working to bring her new Meow Cat Café to the town.
The stay-at-home-mum has been working on the plans for some time and has now secured premises for her new business.
The new café will be coming to the top of Halstead High Street, replacing the old Les Fleurs shop, between Crystal Healing and Costcutter, which closed down.
Rebecca received the keys to the building on May 5, with the original opening date planned for May 20.
However, due to a number of issues, Rebecca has said she has made the “necessary” decision to delay the opening.
In a statement, she said: “I’ve always been honest and open on this journey and unfortunately, we’ve had some bad news.
“It started with a rotten floor, it’s now grown to damp walls, leaking pipes and a whole electrical re-wire.
“This unfortunately means I’ve been left with no other possible choice but to push back our opening day.
“This was truly a last resort for me, and I have tried every single thing I could have possibly done to prevent this, but I can’t.
“This work is necessary and needs to be done, I can’t do this with half measures.
"I’ve put everything in my life on the line to open this business, it needs to be safe and done properly not only for my customers but also for the cats.
“Therefore, I am genuinely devastated to say that I will be pushing back our opening to May 27, a week after our scheduled opening time.
“I will contact everybody in the next two days who was booked in during this week's time frame and either refund your ticket or reschedule for you.
“I am truly sorry to let you down, I hope that you continue to support Meow and I really do look forward to seeing and meeting you all.”
For further updates, keep an eye on the Meow Cat Café Facebook page.
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