The finalists are:
Heartwood Inns has undergone a shocking rebrand over the past year and continues to advance its strong strategy and vision of new investor leadership, with its strong and talented team at the center of its success.
Renowned as Brasserie Bar Co, this company founded by Raymond Blanc, which has 21 locations, has had an exciting and progressive year. This pub branch of the now Heartwood Collection (which includes the Brasserie Blanc premises and is subsidised through Alchemy Partners), introduced in 2010 and has evolved post-Covid with a new focus on wholly-owned venues and venues. It plans to succeed in 60 venues with 500 screens until 2027 and 4 more openings are planned this year.
Newly opened places come with Arado
The strength and continued progress of the company’s human experience, coupled with its impressive Stepping Stones educational program and impactful rewards and popularity initiatives, such as graduations celebrating progress and team appreciation weeks, contribute to its success.
Heartwood Inns has a strong commitment to the sustainability of the ingredients and products it serves and last year obtained the 3* Food Made Good accreditation from the Sustainable Restaurant Association.
The dishes are prepared through its talented team of chefs who use seasonal and quality ingredients, with Raymond Blanc at the head of its gastronomic offer, which receives exceptional degrees of satisfaction from visitors.
Urban Pubs
Founded in 2014 through marketers Nick Pring and Malcolm Heap, the company, whose motto is “Inspired Places to Stay,” has a diverse portfolio of locations, including ping-pong, live sports, and the Bat Pizzeria.
Three exciting new openings in the coming year for the company, which won this award last year, are the railway at Putney, the crossing at Islington and its first adventure at the stations, the Victory at Waterloo, all of which exceed expectations.
Different drinks are featured on site depending on their offering, such as at Lord Walgrave in Marylebone, which offers a wide diversity of whisky to complement its smoking room offering, a superior concentration of craft beer at the wet-only site, Griffin and an epic wine list at the Highgate gatehouse.
Urban Pubs
Their company culture allows them to bring their own concepts to the company, while their free-spirited technique in food sees their talented chefs craft dishes using quality fresh and seasonal ingredients, as well as making their own triple-cooked fries.
With further expansion planned, this dynamic company looks set for a successful year.
The 185-year-old Robinsons family business, run by cousins William and Oliver Robinson, has 260 pubs in the northwest, plus 30 controlled pubs.
Built over the last nine years and employing more than 900 people, its quality-controlled pub spans Cumbria, Yorkshire, North Wales and Cheshire. The accommodation is an evolution of its sales mix, with 266 luxury rooms across the company.
Robinsons’ three successful new openings in the last year come with Hartford Hall in Cheshire, while existing sites are continually reaping smart investment benefits thanks to their powerful physical investment program.
Its impressive collection of pubs includes the airport, an exclusive, high-performance venue overlooking Manchester Airport’s runway and includes a ‘hangar bar’ and ice cream parlour that help generate enviable profits from the site.
Each pub is treated as individual and exclusive and focuses on business styles and is run by trained managers who help implement a strategy they helped create. Managers have a great deal of freedom to implement their own concepts in key business spaces. , but they also have a significant hub with solid structures and tools, adding the newest technology, to help them and their pubs thrive.
At the heart of his good fortune is Robinson’s positive family spirit and strong focus on worker education and development, adding learnings, with proper team retention and also rewards.
Strong food sales, accounting for 50% of total sales, are the platform on which the company was built, with the advancement of five other menu platforms and significant investment in the development of core resources that have produced the perfect effects over the past year.
Robinsons beers account for a significant portion of its pubs’ drink sales, with criteria guaranteed through its ‘Best In Glass’ quality assurance program that a record number of pubs have achieved over the past year.
The company is also running an arts fun program with local schools for students with special educational needs.
Founded and managed in 2002, this dynamic family circle business is one of Scotland’s leading hotel operators and is constantly innovating to contribute to its continued expansion and quest to provide ‘world-class hospitality’.
Its 19 locations across towns and suburbs on the east and west coasts of Scotland boast successful concepts: Scotts, Lido, Herringbone and House, adding the Bridge Inn in Linlithgow and the Fox at Troon, which has its own golf simulator.
Buzzworks prides itself on making a positive social impact in the spaces it opens in, and thanks to its good reputation, it’s able to develop effectively in spaces that many others may not have, such as its amazing Scotts in Greenock. , now the group’s largest site, opened last summer. Other new openings last year were Thirty Knots in South Queensferry, which offers surprising perspectives of the historic Forth Bridge.
To maximise its business, the company has invested in beautiful terraces at its waterfront sites and also has Outboard, a seasonal café/bar located next to Scotts in South Queensferry.
Buzzpaintings, which employs around 800 people, has a people-centric philosophy and has been named eight times by the Sunday Times as ‘Best Companies to Work For’. The company continues to launch interesting and enlightening HR initiatives, adding a high level of flexibility. In cadre schedules, a state-of-the-art internal and internal leadership program that has boosted hiring, overtime pay, especially for general managers, and a prosocial bonus system.
Other people who are making an impact on the programme include their ‘Live Your Life’ initiative, where the team can apply for regular time off to do anything important to them, recruiting chefs from India and Kenya, and a ‘Loan to Help’. Equipment program to help cover holiday costs.
Both purpose and profit are at the heart of decision-making at this progressive company, whose chief executive Kenny Blair is a passionate and hands-on leader who is at the forefront of fashionable Scottish hospitality.