Burger chain McDonald’s is hungry for sites to open up to FIVE new outlest in Plymouth creating hundreds of jobs - despite the home delivery market taking a bite out of restaurant trade.
White Rose 海角视频 Ltd, the franchisee company which already has 12 McDonald’s eateries in Devon and Cornwall and employs more than 1,000 people, sees Plymouth as having huge growth potential both for new sites and deliveries to homes.
Even though the home delivery market has bitten a chunk out of the restaurant trade, it is also attracting new business, with a 7.5% uplift.
Plymouth already has five bricks-and-mortar outlets, and there is another in neighbouring Saltash which was opened in early 2019, but White Rose boss David Wynne said cities of similar size have about double that number.
He said he is actively scouring the city for potential locations, though has ruled out Mutley Plain, in the heart of Plymouth’s studentville.
“We are not looking for any sites in Mutley Plain at the moment,” he said. “But we are actively looking in Plymouth – we’d like to have more restaurants.
“There are pockets were we have an opportunity, but I don’t want to name them. But there is growth potential.”
He added: “Other cities – like Bristol, Portsmouth, Brighton and Southampton – all have more restaurants than Plymouth, they have eight to 10 in some cases”
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Mr Wynne said Plymouth could “absolutely” accommodate an additional three to five McDonald’s and said: “There is potential there, but it’s about finding the right sites.2
Mr Wynne has been associated with McDonald’s for 30 years, beginning as a burger-flipper and at 21 becoming the chain’s youngest 海角视频 restaurant manager.
After 19 years with the firm he asked to become a franchisee, bought five Plymouth venues in 2008, and moved his family to the city for lifestyle reasons.
In 2018 White Rose reported a turnover of £38,633,968 – up from £34.7million just a year earlier - making it the city’s 39 biggest business by revenue.
But its 1,104 workers, half of whom are full-time, make it Plymouth’s eighth largest employer. It is also one of the largest in the region and when it opened it drive-through in Saltash, Cornwall, in March 2019 it created 125 jobs.
“That’s new jobs,” Mr Wynne stressed. “So if we were to open another three sites in Plymouth that would be 375 jobs.”
In addition to growing the number of outlets, Mr Wynne said his existing restaurants were launching new dishes too, including the double quarter pounder with cheese, spicy chicken McNuggets and Twix and Mars McFlurrys.
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“If you stand still you get left behind,” he said.
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A delivery service has also been started, from the two city centre outlets all the way out to Plymstock on the edge of Plymouth.
And delivery services are about to start from the drive-through on Tavistock Road in the north of the city.
The orders are delivered through an exclusive partnership with Uber Eats.
“The delivery market is growing, about 10% of our sales are delivery,” Mr Wynne said. “People are moving away from coming into restaurants, but there will always be a place for them. And a lot of this (delivery market) is new business. We think 75% is new business.”