Brasserie Bar wins £6m injection April 9, 2012 Brasserie Bar Co, the restaurant group fronted by celebrity chef Raymond Blanc has secured a £6m facility from Barclays to fund its expansion. The company, which recently acquired eight former Chez Gerard sites, plans to grow its French eatery chain Brasserie Blanc from 11 to 19 restaurants by the end of the year and a [...]
Graphite Capital in restaurant focus April 26, 2012 ■ Private equity house Graphite Capital is putting £21m behind two of London’s best-known restaurateurs. It has invested in Rex Restaurant Associates, owned by Chris Corbin and Jeremy King, whose venues include The Wolseley, on Piccadilly, and The Delaunay, on the corner of Aldwych and Drury Lane. Corbin and King previously owned Le Caprice and [...]
Shaftesbury profits rise as West End sites fend off retail gloom May 23, 2012 THE PROSPEROUS West End continued to shelter Shaftesbury from the wider gloom in the retail sector as the London property firm posted a 15 per cent jump in first half profits. The company, which owns 500 properties across London’s key tourist hotspots including Carnaby Street and China Town reported a pre-tax profit of £16.1m in [...]
The ace of clubs: Building an innovative legacy at Home House June 17, 2012 WHEN the offer went up by yet another £1m I had to say yes. My heart was heavy though because I was proud of what we had created from scratch, against the odds. I’d also had a lot of fun. The business was the now famous London club, Home House. Eight years earlier, Brian Clivaz [...]
Good marketing can be as impossible as trying to read minds June 10, 2012 THE blond haired, middle-aged PR guru slouched back in his armchair and confidently announced his “stunning” idea to me. The little girl, Madeleine, had recently disappeared in Portugal and there was massive public sympathy and frenzied press coverage. To my sensitive agent, struggling to justify his hefty monthly fees, this represented a fantastic opportunity. “A [...]
£140m deal for Makro UK will boost Booker May 30, 2012 FOOD wholesaler Booker aims to turn around the loss-making cash and carry firm Makro UK after taking it off the hands of German retailer Metro in a £140m deal. It will hand Metro £15.8m and a 9.99 per cent stake in Booker as the two firms agree to work together on improving their supply chains [...]
The fine philosophy of the world’s third best kitchen May 7, 2012 THEY do things differently in Spain – the football, the recessions and the food. Definitely the food. I’m not talking about the penchant for eating fried calamari in a baguette (carbs? What carbs?) or the way meat trumps vegetables every time or the archetypal beauty of the jamon. No, I’m talking about philosophy: an unironic, [...]
An alternative paradise August 5, 2012 IT is raining on Dominica, and this is no passing shower. I’m soaked to the skin, I’ve lost the sole from my shoe and I’m covered in a reddy brown mud. Dominica, known as the “nature island”, is already turning all my preconceptions about a Caribbean “paradise” on their head. Not famous for its white [...]
The delights of Gstaad in summer July 1, 2012 GSTAAD, in the German-speaking canton of Berne, is about as ritzy a resort as you can get. It’s got the prices and celebrity factor of Verbier, but it’s smaller. Much smaller. And therefore, much classier – like a rare tiny diamond instead of a bling-tastic shop window. Not that there aren’t bling-tastic shop windows in [...]
SUNTORY WHISKY AND CIGAR TASTING COMPETITION April 27, 2012 WIN A SUNTORY WHISKY AND CIGAR TASTING EVENING AT EIGHT CLUB, IN THE HEART OF THE CITY Suntory and Eight Club are offering five pairs of tickets to an exclusive whisky and cigar sampling evening conducted by Zoran Peric and Przemek Zaneap at the club’s Moorgate premises. Address: 1 Dysart Street, London EC2 2BX Tel: [...]