Kris Gumbrell, managing director of Brewhouse & Kitchen, has told MCA the company is increasingly targeting retail development sites and has strengthened his team to allow for rapid expansion.
Yesterday the company announced its 11th B&K would open in Cheltenham’s The Brewery.
It will open in May, preceded by a site in Southbourne, to open in two weeks’s time, and will be followed by an opening in Bournemouth in the summer.
Gumbrell told MCA there were currently three other sites in legals. He said the next phase of development would focus on freehold pubs but stressed that leisure developments offered significant potential for the company.
He said: “We don’t see it as competing with casual dining but there are an awful lot of Italian and Mexican offers out there, so good quality pub food done consistently offers a point of difference. It’s actually quite hard to find a good fish and chips or a pie and seasonal vegs in that sort of environment – even Sunday Roast seems to be under threat.”
He said aside from the growth the priority was the Experience brewing packages, which are currently offered and seven sites with over 70 packages being redeemed per week. Gumbrell said over the Christmas period £53,000 worth of packages were sold.
He said: “Everybody is food, everyone is liquor – you need something else and the big selling point the on-trade will always have over the off-trade is that it can offer an experience so we are just maximising that.”
B&K has recently added two key roles to with Matt Pressinger joining from All Star Lanes, as head of marketing and Hayley Connor, formerly of The Restaurant Group, taking on the role of head of people and learning.
