Hard Rock park leaves local businesses holding the bag

By: Thema Ponton | SCNow
Published: January 03, 2009

Charles Moore, with Rockstar Cabs, said the company was depending on a lot of business from Hard Rock Park.

Moore said they were told some 30,000 visitors would need to get to the park, so Rockstar made a sizable deal, hoping to make a sizable profit.

But when Hard Rock Park closed, the promise of all those people and all that profit was not so dependable.

"When they closed their doors, a lot of people thought that we closed with them and it caused our phones to stop ringing quite a bit because people though when they went down, we went down with them, which of course is not true," Moore said.

Moore said Rockstar is still owed thousands of dollars from the park, but he doesn't think they'll ever see it.

"What can you do, you know you feel like you know, we made money over there, so you know roll with the punches," said Moore.

Rik Dickinson, owner of Encore Video Productions said his company documented the park's progress from dirt to completion, but the last invoice they sent to the park, was not paid, and he is also owed thousands of dollars.

"Nobody likes to lose money, although they paid us a lot of money and we made money, we didn't lose money, but we feel and felt good about supporting the project," Dickinson said.

Moore and Dickinson said Hard Rock's hard times is not just bad for them, a business that doesn't make it is bad for the community.

"It hurts Myrtle Beach, it hurts the whole area for something to come and go that quickly and now to go from chapter eleven to chapter seven is even worse, that means that they really, it was a real boondoggle," Dickinson said.