La Tasca Group, the tapas-led casual dining group, is to take its restaurant presence in the US to five with the opening of a new outlet in Rockville, Maryland, next March.
The company opened its first outlet in the US in Washington DC in November 2003, and opened its fourth stateside restaurant last month in Alexandria, Virginia.
The group has further outlets in Clarendon, Virginia, and in Baltimore, which opened in March earlier this year.
James Horler, chief executive of La Tasca, also said the company was close to signing a deal on the first London site for La Vina, its premium Spanish dining brand.
The site in central London, which will open before the end of the year, will be the seventh La Vina to open since the company launched the brand in September 2004.
The company is also set to expand Sam & Maxie’s, its fledging diner concept, to two more sites by the end of 2006, after launching its first outlet in Stevenage in April.
The second Sam & Maxie’s will open in the Trafford Centre, Manchester in mid-September, to be followed by a further outlet in Milton Keynes in October.
Horler said the companywas “very pleased” with the early progress made by the Stevenage outlet.
The company’s latest opening of its core restaurant brand, La Tasca will take place in Cheltenham in mid-September.
Horler said the company plans to follow the Cheltenham launch, which will be the group’s 55th La Tasca, by opening its highest profile London site in the West End in October.
The group, which currently operates 65 outlets, intends to open 14 new restaurants in total during its 2006/7 financial year.
Horler said that trading had hit a “significant blip” during the World Cup, mostly as a result of consumers staying away from its city centre sites but had shown signs of a “healthy recovery” since the end of the tournament.
