Barracuda plans to opens 30 new sites
Managed operator Barracuda Group plans to open 30 further sites this year to nudge the estate close to 200 outlets.
The move represents an investment of around £30m, creating up to 9,000 jobs. It confirms Barracuda's status as the operator with the fastest organic growth, following its £262m refinancing by private-equity firm Charterhouse last summer.
Barracuda chief executive Mark McQuater said the company has "pretty much" identified where the new sites will be. "The majority are in the central body of England, in the north of England, the northern Home Counties and the south coast," he said.
A couple of new sites will also launch in Wales and south-west England, and three more in Scotland, McQuater said.
The Barracuda boss said that most of the new openings will be Smith & Jones outlets but there will be "a number" of Varsity student bars and "a peppering" of the South African-
themed Barracuda Bars.
The group opened six pubs in nine days last month, in Chesterfield, Hull, Portsmouth, Accrington, Redcar and Hinck-ley. The next opening will be a Smith & Jones outlet in Gainsborough, Lincolnshire, in February.
On the prospect of snapping up former Spirit Group pubs that will be sold by Punch Taverns, McQuater said: "We will wait and see. I wouldn't say it's at the top of our list but we'd be interested to see if it fits".
Barracuda opened an office in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, last month to cope with the expansion. "We are going hell for leather," said McQuater. "We are more confident than we have ever been."
