Top 50 Indie Park Garage Group (PGG) is hoping to franchise out its Bakery 79 food to go concept to other forecourt operators next year, having completed its roll-out at 12 of its own sites last month.
Since January, the third generation family business, has been experimenting with its seventies-inspired brown and orange brand, which originally went live with a range of savoury pastries, giant donuts, and food bowls, at its petrol filling station in Wimborne in Dorset.
The Croydon-based business invested around £100k in developing the concept – with a further cost of £24k for each site taking the branding, Bakery 79 coffee machines, a back office system, tills and card machines.
It says since replacing Greggs units with its own food to go solution, it is matching margins, and sales pound for pound at the converted sites. Going forward there is scope to tweak the range to increase margin to up to 70%, maintains director Manoj Tandon, who showed off Bakery 79 at the National Convenience Show last week.
The 77-strong forecourt business has appointed Priya Bandara, former senior food operations manager at Applegreen, head of food to go at PGG, and she is currently working on a summer menu. It is set to include a children’s range, including a Bakery 79 version of the happy meal, and healthy eating options including “nutritious bowls”.
By the end of the year, PGG hopes to operate Bakery 79 in at least 20 of its own forecourts. However, for now at least, says Tandon, Subway and Creams, will continue to be in place at around 10 of its sites.
It is the flexibility of tweaking the food to go operation, which makes an own-brand option so appealing, says Tandon, who runs Park Garage Group with his cousin Hemant.
Bakery 79 uses deliveries from Blakemore, with typically four to six staff working the units throughout the day, and building the premium donuts, sandwiches, food pots and salads on site.
“Pricing wise we keep within 20p above and below of what Greggs charges so that the margins are still up there. Plus we don’t have to pay their franchise fee,” says Tandon.
“We are looking at a roadmap to hit the same sales as we had with Greggs, which is what we are doing,” says Tandon. “And that is despite launching something brand new to customers versus an established national brand that has a large marketing budget.”
Central to this is using the Cybake bakery analytics software in conjunction with Madic’s evoBackOffice and evoPOS till systems. This helps time when to bake off more product, and is on track to reduce wastage of the Bakery 79 units from around 15% now, to 10%.
The Cybake tech is proving so accurate that it also allows Park Garage Group to avoid VAT on selling hot food. Timing is so precise that the sausage rolls, pasties, and slices displayed as an ambient product, and not from a hot food counter, are generally still warm, and fresher, when purchased, says Tandon.
“What Priya and her team are trying to do is to enhance everything we used to have and make the quality and freshness ten times better,” says Tandon.
The Bakery 79 name is a nod to Park Garage Group being founded in 1979 by Tandon’s grandparents Madan and Sneh Tandon. The business was later run by his father Balraj and uncle Sunil. Bakery 79 is a natural progression for PGG known for building its own brands from Park & Shop to Park & Charge.
“Having experience of food to go for several years we thought it was the right time to launch our own brand reflecting our own ethos and business culture, and to give us greater flexibility to introduce things like the English Breakfast in a bowl for £4.50,” says Tandon.
“The seventies’ vibe is very on trend. Bakery 79 brings something vibrant, light and fun to food to go,” he adds.
