Popular Warrnambool cafe to close its doors over new hospitality vaccination rules

Siblings Rebekah Mahmoud and Anton Habel, who own popular Liebig Street cafe Brightbird Espresso, said they did not feel they could stay open during a time where they had to enforce rules that divided the community.

"It just doesn't sit right," she said. "We can't bring ourselves to shut out customers who come here.

"They majority of our customers are vaccinated, some of them are not and some of them we don't know because we don't ask them. It's not really our business."

The decision to close the doors on the business, hopefully temporarily, was one they had only made in the past few days.

"We just couldn't see ourselves standing at the door and checking everybody's personal details. We don't check to see if they have been vaccinated for other transmittable diseases," Ms Mahmoud said.

"We decided we would rather close the door until we don't need to make a decision like that.

"It doesn't fit with the whole word that is hospitality."

Ms Mahmoud questioned why they weren't being asked to check for a negative tests or immunity as well as vaccination like they do in European countries. "Then it would be equal across the board," she said.

Ms Mahmoud said they had a date in mind for how long they could continue to pay rent on the store while it was closed before they made the final call on the future of the business.

"If nothing's changed we'll be changing direction in what we do," she said.

Ms Mahmoud said they were not trying to prove a point, and they didn't expect their decision would draw any attention.

"We've made a decision and we can rest easy with that decision. What happens after that is not really in our hands so much," she said.

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Ms Mahmoud said she was not in the least politically minded and was not in to controversy.

"We just felt it was a point where it was not sitting right with our values. It's not the Australia that we know," she said.

"We don't want to create division.

"Businesses have to follow rules, and if we are not comfortable with those rules then we need to close."

Ms Mahmoud said they had been buoyed by the support they'd received so far for their decision, from people on both sides of the fence. "It's been amazing."

Next week would have been the second anniversary of the pair taking over the business, which has been allowed to continue trading throughout the pandemic.

"We've been lucky to have so many beautiful people walk through those doors and we really hope that we can open them again," she said.

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