Whitbread to launch first city centre Beefeater in 'evolved' format in Birmingham

By Mark Wingett

- Last updated on GMT

New Beefeater format for Birmingham city centre

Related tags Whitbread

Whitbread, operator of Premier Inn and Costa, is set to launch an evolved version of its Beefeater pub restaurant format in Birmingham city centre next year, M&C has learnt.

The company, which currently operates c140 sites under the brand, has applied to convert its existing Thyme restaurant under its Premier Inn in Waterloo Street in the city to the new unit, that has a working title of Beefeater Bar & Block.

The site will be Beefeater's first in a a city centre, having previously co-located sites with Premier Inns in less centralised locations.

Whitbread relaunched a remodelled version of the Beefeater brand in 2012 and has rolled this out to around a third of its existing estate.

Earlier this year, Whitbread appointed Phil Birbeck, formerly of Dixons Carphone, as the new managing director of its c400-strong pub restaurant division.

Whitbread’s restaurant estate, which generates sales of c£543m, is currently in the process of upgrading its Beefeater and Brewers Fayre estates, and rolling out new format Whitbread Inns. The latter brand has already been launched across 13 sites.

The group also operates local restaurant format Table Table and value offer Taybarns.

Earlier this month, the company reported Q3 like-for-likes rose 1.7% across its Restaurants division, while for the year to date like-for-like sale were up 0.6%.

In July, Whitbread strengthened its pub restaurants operations team with the appointment of a new national operations director and expanded its Inns format to further sites.

Richard Mcelroy, who has been with the company for nearly 10 years, the last four as operations director at Brewers Fayre and Premier Inn, took on the new national role.

The chain recently launched a new campaign urging Brits to shun turkey for steak at Christmas​.

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