Waitrose managing director Rob Collins has said he believes there is still an opportunity for dine-in concepts in the supermarket sector, despite Tesco’s failure with its in-store Giraffe restaurants, if the execution is right.
Speaking to MCA’s sister title The Grocer, Collins said that he expects a number of the retailer’s new foodservice concepts to achieve further growth for the business, including bakery grazing areas, sushi counters, juice bars and wine bars as well as new cafes and food to go offers.
His inspiration was a trip to the US. He told The Grocer: “We were immediately struck by the number of covers: 200-300 was not uncommon. And we resolved that we needed to become a serious foodservice business.”
With 82 introduced so far, the most fully developed is the new bakery grazing concept (“we’re building some scale now”) while the 23 Sushi Daily counters are “ahead of the budget” agreed with the concession. But the precise mix (or “clustering”) is tailored store by store dependent on the size and location of the store and the demographics.
He said: “The opportunity for wine bars is smaller: we only have wine bars in seven locations and they all have slightly different designs. We’re on a journey. What we’re learning is you’ve got to create enough seating and enough covers. Worcester has 260 covers, when you include the cafe, the wine bar and the bakery. I went in at 3pm two or three weeks after it opened and the wine bar was full and our cafes are well occupied too.”
