From a visit to Lunch! to £100k new catering turnover

In This Issue

The bigger picture

New restaurant helps fuel over 80% increase in sales for Highfield Garden World

The search is on for The Greatest Breakfast Sandwich

Expand your catering offering with lunch!

GCA reports good food and catering sales for July

Heligan Harvest - A taste of heritage

Sweet taste of bee harvest success at Webbs

Join Jose Pizarro at Speciality & Fine Food Fair

Moonshine brewing bags reinvent the art of home brewing

Latest Rational will get all 5 senses stimulated at GLEE 2014

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From a visit to Lunch! to £100k new catering turnover

Two years ago the team from Baytree Garden Centre visited Lunch! looking for ideas to help them with their idea of opening an extra coffee shop.

One year ago their plans and ideas came to fruition with the opening of The Baytree Coffee Lounge which is now delivering £100k extra catering turnover to the garden centre.

Following on from the visit to Lunch! they first tested the market for food and beverage sales in the main shop with in-store baked cookies and coffee during their busy Christmas period. With positive feedback space was allocated in the main shop and The Baytree Coffee Lounge opened in September 2013.

As they come up to their first anniversary, tunrover is projected to be almost £100k from 40 covers and 4 staff.

Without a kitchen area directly attached The Baytree Coffee lounge concentrates on selling good coffee, pannini's, ciabattas, toasties and cakes all day long. Now that they are up and running all of these are made freshly at Baytree. "We initially thought pre-prepared products would be best to serve, but our customers soon told us that they expected and preferred home made. Some now come regularly for Lemon Drizzle cake."

Their most popular pannini at the moment is Brie and Bacon, and when it comes to baguettes, egg tops the Baytree Coffe Lounge bestsellers chart. All of their toasties and sandwiches are served on smart slates with a touch of salad and crisps. "This summer we've added wraps to the menu. Duck and Hoisin sauce, served with prawn crackers and salad has become a customer favourite."

In the past few months an outside seating area has been added within the planteria and a popular new line is milk shakes made from customers choice of ice cream flavours.

The Baytree Coffee Lounge team have also got linked sales working well. The £5.99 bottles of Balsamic Glaze, as used on their salad, sells out every week and they sell plenty of Lincolnshire Plum Loaves at £2.99 each as a result of it being on their afternoon tea menu.

Nigel Wallis, general manager of Baytree Garden Centre told GTN Food Xtra: "The Coffee Lounge has cost us around £13k to set up and so far it has exceeded all our expectations, without having any detrimental effect on the business in the Hop-In Restaurant. We are learning all the time and making changes as we develop. The team are going back to Lunch! this year looking for ideas to extend their offering during the winter and once again make the most of our busy Christmas period."

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