Adam Marshall is a control freak and he’s not afraid to admit it.
“I like to manage any uncertainties in the business and I enjoy the complete control over its direction; its successes, its failures - whether it’s food menus, recruitment, marketing. It is a positive,” insists the co-founder of the now eight-strong Grand Union cocktails and burgers bar brand. “I like to be involved in all parts and I feel it is my job to keep hold of all the different strands.”
His heavily hands-on approach – he even personally sources light fittings and specifies the leather for the Chesterfield-style banquette seating – has worked well for him, to be fair. As he points out, the business started in 2006 with the help of a £25,000 loan that he told the bank was for a car, and it now has net turnover of £8.5m.
It is now almost a year since Luke Johnson took on the 50% stake in the business held by the other half of the original founding duo, Adam Saword, and the company is on the brink of embarking on the next stage of its development.
Marshall loved the buzz and mutual loyalty when building the business with his best friend from school, but it is obvious that he is now relishing the freedom to make decisions entirely his way. He first got a taste of that when he opened the Bullet Bar live music venue in Kentish Town - before Grand Union and following a brief partnership running a gastropub in Highgate; his first business venture after vowing not to work for anyone else when he saw how little money he was paid compared to the amount he had been making for Brighton bar operator C-side (he originally trained as a chef at Rules restaurant in London before a brief spell at Jarvis hotels then chefing jobs during 18 months of travels taking in Thailand and Australia). Marshall and Saword are still good friends but Marshall diplomatically says that if they were still working together, it would not be harmoniously.
It was always the plan to bring an investor into Grand Union, Marshall says, and the timing was perfect all round – Saword wanted to pursue property business interests and Marshall was and still is itching to learn about growing a chain. The business had previously been courted by Private Equity firms but given Marshall’s self-assured, determined nature, it seems the route he has gone down now with Johnson is absolutely right for him.
“I met a few private equity companies and I didn’t get on with any of them particularly well – I don’t think I met any that had actually been in this industry and built a business and could therefore understand that it is quite volatile. With Grand Union, for instance, we excel at outdoor areas and so when the weather is on our side, we do amazing business but obviously it can’t always be that good. Luke gets that.”
Marshall says the partnership with Johnson, who leaves him to manage the business but supports him with weekly phone calls and regular board meetings, “could not be going any better”.
“The relationship is still quite new – hopefully it will be a good five to ten years long - but I know my learning ability is going to exponentially grow as a result and will exceed my expectations.”
To meet both his and Johnson’s identical ambitions for the brand to become “a big entity”, Marshall understands he will have to change what he does on a day to day basis and is ready to take on that challenge. He has a strong operational team, recently completed with appointment of a sales and marketing director, and for all he jokes about being a control freak, he is not into micro-management. He is humble enough to know he doesn’t always get it right and astute enough to realise that admitting to and changing wrong decisions quickly will cost him less in the long run.
The company has also appointed a PR agency, Roche Communications, to help it raise its profile beyond its existing customer base and the trade, where it has already made a mark. Grand Union will be entered into more awards, for example, as a way of getting is name and quality front of mind with consumers and landlords, and will also focus more on social media; third party tie-ups such as hosting launch events; and working with Gandys Flip Flops, the footwear brand that funds orphanages, as its charity partner. A design agency is also about to be appointed. So Marshall is getting some help holding the reins before he spends what he anticipate will be about 90% of his time for five years from this autumn, looking for sites for new Grand Union bars, a job that he is looking forward to.
He is feeling confident as “custodian of the DNA of Grand Union”, that the group, complete with newly tweaked branding and a style update launched at the revamped Brixton branch that includes more of the brand’s signature indoor and outdoor treehouses for pre-bookable groups, is now at a stage that others can ensure is applied correctly at other existing and future sites.
For now Marshall’s time is full. As well as helping take forward the big summer marketing push around the World Cup and selling garden parties, he is introducing the new cocktail menu and the deconstructed food menu featuring five core easy-to-eat, high quality, good value and quick to prepare dishes such as burgers and pizzas.
With all this, and the fact that Johnson is pretty occupied with the IPO of his Patisserie Valerie bakery business, it is likely to be late summer before there’s announcement on the next new Grand Union location.
“I don’t like the fact that other bar companies are blazing a trail, there is part of me that is envious,” Marshall says. As competitive as he is, and despite his absolute belief in the Grand Union concept from day one, Marshall adds that as a 38-year-old father to a seven-year-old boy, he is way more risk averse than in his youth and is therefore begrudgingly happy that the company’s next phase has been delayed beyond his original aspirations.
“Grand Union is going to have its time, but I don’t think it is this year,” he says.
The plan from 2015 is to expand Grand Union at the rate of about three sites a year in London until the brand reaches 20 to 25 outlets when it will consider other regions.
Marshall’s strategy is to take leasehold sites, whether retail units or pub company-owned tied pubs (the emphasis on cocktails rather than beer means brewery ties have minimal impact on margins), in secondary locations. Bar a couple of not so good sites, now offloaded, it is a method that he admits often means harder work in building the business up but it has so far proved successful overall.
“I would rather take a risk on a secondary location than a risk on a premium of £300,000 to £400,000,” Marshall explains.
He says that they have the ability to take on freeholds and acquire a small group, and have looked at some in the past although there is nothing on their radar at the moment
It is also typical of his style of not following the crowd. As is his entire business model. When the vast majority of the industry is focussing on casual dining, Marshall’s concept is wet led (the sales mix is typically 80:20 in favour of drink) with a late licence and dancing.
“If all my friends and peers are walking in one direction I am guaranteed to be walking in totally the opposite direction,” he laughs.
