3/4/2025 10:13:00 AM
Star Pubs has announced it is to expand its Just Add Talent (JAT) managed operator estate by 30 pubs this year, converting the sites from its leased and tenanted portfolio, reports Pub & Bar. To help recruit and build a pipeline of operators ready to run the new pubs, the Heineken-owned company is launching virtual Discovery Days to enable potential applicants to find out more about what is involved in running a managed operator pub. In addition, Star is offering a free three-day pre-entry online training course to every successfully screened applicant.
The number of B Corp hotels in the UK is on the rise, as hotel guests prioritise making sustainable choices says Boutique Hotelier. Between 2021 and 2024, seven UK properties earned B Corp status, a certification which measures a company's entire social and environmental impact. The upswing in B Corp Hotels comes after new research from BWH Hotels found hotel guests are willing to pay more for sustainable stays. The survey of nearly 1,200 BWH Reward guests revealed 67% say sustainability matters so much they'd pay more for a hotel with strong green credentials.
Sales at Britain's leading restaurant, pub and bar groups fell by 1.3% year-on-year in January, the latest CGA RSM Hospitality Business Tracker reveals. The sales dip, which follows like-for-life growth of 3.2% in December, is the Tracker's lowest since April 2024, and only the second month of negative trading since early 2022. It comes as costs continue to rise for business groups - especially in labour, where National Insurance spending is set to increase substantially from April this year. Despite Dry January, pubs performed the best of the major hospitality channels in the Tracker, with like-for-like sales down by just 0.1%, advises Restaurant Online.
Hotel du Vin Bristol has unveiled a £1.1m refurbishment, as part of the lifestyle brand's multi-million-pound revitalisation initiative, says Hotel Owner. The transformation has been spearheaded by designer Anita Rosato paying homage to the grade-II building's industrial heritage. Hotel du Vin has revealed that it is also making a £3.7m investment in the revitalisation of Hotel du Vin Henley-on-Thames due to be completed in Autumn 2025 and that Cannizaro House in Wimbledon is to undergo an extensive transformation also in Autumn 2025.
Chef Vivek Singh's Cinnamon Kitchen brand is to open its first restaurant outside London in partnership with a hotel, reports The Caterer. The casual Indian restaurant group will open in the Queens hotel in Leeds city centre in May. It will be the third venue for the Cinnamon Kitchen brand, which has two London restaurants in Devonshire Square in the City and in Battersea Power Station. Cinnamon Kitchen was founded by Singh in 2008 as a casual alternative to his flagship Westminster restaurant the Cinnamon Club. Singh's wider Cinnamon Collection group includes the Cinnamon Bazaar brand, which has restaurants in London's Covent Garden and Richmond.
Leading North East-based leisure company, STACK has plans to open four new venues says CLH News. STACK - which creates food and entertainment hubs by using repurposed shipping containers or giving new life to redundant buildings - had a highly successful 2024, with the opening of three new sites. And that is set to be topped in 2025, with the company confirming that another four of its sites will open in the next 12 months. The highly anticipated flagship site at the historic Worswick Chambers remains on track to open in late spring as STACK Newcastle.
Is 7pm the new 8pm? More consumers opting to visit the on-trade earlier in the day. Late night, was the day part seeing the highest percentage decline in footfall, reports the Morning Advertiser...