Santander invests £1.8m in London restaurant chain Rosa’s Thai cafe January 26, 2016 Santander has invested £1.8m into London restaurant chain Rosa's Thai cafe, to help it expand in the capital. The investment, including an £800,000 Growth Capital loan, will fund the opening of three new restaurants in 2016, first in Victoria, and then Brixton and Shoreditch. The company hopes the new restaurants will create 100 jobs over the next two [...]
Soulcycle, Insanity, CrossFit: Where do fitness fads and cults come from? January 25, 2016 Cult workout regimes are big business, whether it's Insanity's Shaun Thomson raking in millions or the cult of CrossFit recruiting evangelical members across the globe. We take a look at where they started. Insanity The Insanity workout was founded when BeachBody, a Californian fitness company, started searching for a charismatic trainer and came across Shaun Thomson, [...]
McDonald’s fills up on all day breakfast as fourth quarter sales rise January 25, 2016 McDonald’s has served up a five per cent jump in global like-for-like sales in the fourth quarter as efforts to turnaround its ailing US business showed signs of paying off. The fast food giant, which promoted former UK boss Steve Easterbrook to the top spot a year ago, said US fourth quarter comparable sales increased by 5.7 per cent, thanks in [...]
M Restaurant’s Martin Williams on Wagyu, division bells and building a brand January 25, 2016 There is something of the Midas touch about Martin Williams. Forty minutes into an interview about his restaurants, M Threadneedle Street and M Victoria Street – currently two of the capital’s trendiest hangouts – he mentions his previous life as an actor. Despite being successful on stage and TV in his early twenties, the on-off [...]
O2 arena plans for a new designer outlet win £185m backing from Lloyds Banking Group January 21, 2016 Lloyds Banking Group is backing the owners of the O2 arena in Greenwich with a £185m loan to finance the building of a new designer shopping outlet to rival Bicester Village and Wembley. The loan by Lloyds’ commercial banking arm will allow the O2’s owners AEG and Crosstree Real Estate, to push ahead with the [...]
Darkhorse Stratford restaurant review: more nag than stallion January 20, 2016 I'm calling January 2016 as the moment the restaurant template that's dominated London for the last five years finally jumped the shark. Far too many new openings appear to have been cobbled together, Inception-style, from my memories of other restaurants, from the interior design to the locally sourced, modern European menus. There's a cynicism to the uniformity. It's a formula that [...]
City Moves for 19 January 2016 | Who’s switching jobs January 19, 2016 Bryan Cave International law firm Bryan Cave has announced two new appointments to its London office. Corporate partner Sarah Atkinson joins the transactions client service group from Hogan Lovells. Associate Yannis Erifillidis joins the financial services client service group from Norton Rose Fulbright. Sarah’s experience concentrates on cross-border M&A, private equity and general corporate advisory work. [...]
Private equity firms dine out on restaurant chains January 19, 2016 The restaurants and bar sector was a veritable feeding frenzy of deals last year, with more choice of companies to buy than an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet. Robust trading conditions thanks to improved consumer spending provided an opportune time for private equity companies to sell long-term investments to rival buyout firms with cash to spend. CBPE’s sale of [...]
The amazing comeback of Mexico’s most exclusive retreat January 18, 2016 Mexico has many faces. Anyone with half an eye on international news this week will have noticed the furore surrounding the recapture of mega drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, and the murder of Temixco Mayor Gisela Mota after only one day in office. However, none of this seems to have put people off going [...]
Equistone takes £100m prime cut of Argentinian steak house Gaucho January 17, 2016 The Gaucho chain of Argentinian steak restaurants has been snapped up by a hungry buyout firm in a deal thought to be worth around £100m. Equistone, the private equity firm previously owned by Barclays, is said to have beaten other interested suitors to buy a majority stake in the chain. Gaucho’s founder, the Dutch entrepreneur Zeev [...]