Premium doughnut concept Longboys will shift its focus to larger sit-down formats, as it looks towards new openings in London Borough Yards and Liverpool Street.
Founder Graham Hornigold said during a panel at a Generation Next event that this marks a move away from market-style locations where it previously operated in Camden’s Hawley Wharf as well as Seven Dials.
“We’ve come out of all of those spaces because we want to open at our own times, so we can diversify our product range a bit more,” he said.
This will also allow the brand to capitalise on “early morning revenue” and hit the morning coffee trade.
The brand, created by Hornigold and fellow pastry chef Heather Kaniuk was launched in 2019, offering long doughnuts with similar dimensions to an éclair, with a variety of fillings.
Previously, both held executive pastry chef roles at a string of top hotels and restaurant groups including Hakkasan Group and Mandarin Oriental.
With 35 seats planned for its new Borough Yards site, a more spacious format aims to “keep people in for longer”, says Hornigold.
“The space is there because sometimes it is raining, we were losing customers because you couldn’t sit in the stores”, he added.
“The new spaces that we’ve got, means we can give as many people our product as we can, but with us in control.”
Hornigold believes the concept is highly scalable, if the brand can find “the right partners”, and “the right sites.” It currently operates sites in Kings Cross’ Coal Drops Yard and Box Park Wembley.
“There’s definitely more scope to grow.”
The concept was originally conceived due to a perceived gap in the market for “longform doughnuts.”
“We thought we’d bring that to the market.” He maintains that the style is “better for eating, you can get flavour in every bite.”
“It keeps the mouth guessing, it’s about a journey versus just a sugar fix.”
At £4.50 per doughnut, Hornigold added that “you would be hard pushed to match that flavour”, for the same price point elsewhere.
Challenges for growing a pastry brand in the current climate include, “finding investors who can see it for what it is”, says the co-founder.
“Finding the right people, having the core team around you that believes in the vision and will help drive it when you’re not there.
“People that believe in you, and not just the business.”
