Simmons Bars remains focused on expansion in the capital, with its 24th site opening this week, and several more in the pipeline, chief executive Nick Campbell has told MCA.
The Lonsdale Capital-backed late night bar operator will open its latest venue at the former Bar site on Clapham High Street on Thursday (18 August) and is currently at the build stage on its next venue in Holborn (the former Parkers wine bar and restaurant on Kingsway), with three more sites in legals.
The group has previously talked about expansion outside the capital, but Simmons is content to focus its efforts on London, for the immediate future at least.
“We have a lot more to do in London and we want to make sure that operationally we are in a good place to go national,” Campbell said.
“We are getting some great new sites and once we are ready, probably early next year, we will start seriously looking outside (London).”
The business has acquired seven sites since the end of lockdown last spring: Old Street, Brick Lane, Tottenham Court Road, Putney, Leicester Square, Bank and Greek Street – all of which were open by the beginning of this year and have been trading very well.
“We’ve had a really positive start and it has continued,” Campbell said. Commenting on the huge demand it saw coming out of lockdown last year, he said Simmons thought it might be a bit of a halo effect, “but it lasted continuously […] and we have been busy ever since”.
Its like-for-like sales were tracking +50% up on 2019 levels for the majority of 2021 and are sitting at well above +20% so far in 2022. While EBITDA has more than tripled on 2019 levels, with FY22, “by far the group’s most successful, profitable and record-breaking year to date”.
“I think we fell into a sort of niche of what people really wanted after being stuck at home for a long period of time… cocktails, partying and general affordability.”
While the pandemic was challenging in many ways, Campbell said the business handled itself well and managed to come out of it “pretty positively”, with the work it did within the business during lockdown and the opening of its new venues contributing to increased brand awareness.
“We took advantage of a lot of vacant units that were coming up,” Campbell said. And while property opportunities currently are less favourable, he is optimistic that there will be more to come within the next six months, as energy costs start to bite, and with government support long gone.
“Energy prices going up will have a really big effect on businesses, so I think sadly we’ll probably see quite a lot more casualties over the next few months.
“I thought there would be more at the end of last year, but I think the moratorium and the support that was there managed to keep quite a lot of companies in business. It was not quite the bloodbath I thought it would be.”
In terms of the impact of price rises on the consumer, Campbell said it would be naïve to think it won’t have an impact on hospitality spending as “it’s not like we are dealing with small numbers”, in terms of increases in people’s bills.
He said Simmons prioritised having an affordable offer, so as not to price itself out of people’s wallets. “We always keep that at the forefront our of minds.”
