Ex-M&B boss opens another pub

Former Mitchells & Butlers executive Chris Gerard has re-opened a Mitchells & Butlers (M&B) franchised site, the Royal Oak near Hitchin, as the Rusty Gun — a pub that includes a produce store selling local food items.

Gerard, who left M&B in 2003, has invested £200,000 of his own money into the re-developed pub — it took £28,000 in its first week of trading at the start of this month.

At M&B, Gerard ran a £400m turnover division and opened around 270 pubs, before leaving in 2003 to start his current business, Innventure.

The Rusty Gun is Innventure's sixth pub. One of the other sites, the Wellington at Welwyn, a Greene King leased site, is due to re-open in mid-May after a fire closed it last year.

A total of £1.6m has been invested in the new-look Wellington, a medieval building, which will re-open with six boutique bedrooms.

Gerard said: "This development will be outstanding — I've invested around £350,000 in developing the boutique bedrooms."

Innventure also operates D'arry's in Cambridge which has a new new managing partner Solly Cham and head chef, Nick Zwolinsky.

Cham joins from Sidney Sussex College, where he was senior hall manager while Zwolinsky was previously senior sous chef at Sheene Mill and has worked at a number of Michelin-starred restaurants across the country.

Gerard reports that all of his existing pub businesses are in "substantial growth" this year.