AN entrepreneur has saved the Kursaal tenpin bowling alley in Southend.

Mehdi Afshar, who owns 1st Bowl and now has 23 venues across Britain, has bought the venue and promised to keep all the 25 staff currently working there.

The Echo revealed last month how the alley was going to close in February.

But now Mr Afshar, 45, is due to pick up the keys by the end of the month and he can’t wait to add the 30-lane venue to his flourishing empire, now the third largest tenpin bowling operator in the UK.

He said: “Whenever we buy a new venue, we look at two things.

“Firstly, we assess whether the business suits the area where the building is, then secondly we look at the potential for us to develop the business once we take over.

“Looking at the Kursaal, it just ticked so many boxes for us, for example the amount of tourism in Southend and it is the only alley around there. I didn’t hesitate to buy the place.”

Current owners Essendon decided to close the alley, which was opened in 1998, as part of a national restructuring of the company.

Mr Afshar started his company last October and has quickly moved from owning one site in Lewisham, south London, to 23.

He has also recently bought the Eddies Bowling and Snooker Hall in Radford Way, Billericay.

He said: “Over the last year we have taken some massive gambles, but each of these gambles are calculated and our growth shows you how well we’ve done.”

Mr Afshar went on to say he has not yet made his mind up whether or not to make any significant changes to the site.