Hey Hot Potatoes,

Welcome to the latest edition of the Hot Potato Newsletter! With the World Cup around the corner, I am absolutely buzzing and I think this is the year England finally win it. It’s also great news for hospitality, with £900m expected to be sent across hospitality venues… a much needed boost. A few spots I’ve been recently that deserve a shoutout - Weezies Pizza, newly opened and amazing, ice cream at Mamasons Dirty Ice Cream and an incredible bagel at Mokoko in Bristol.

This week we're looking at the UK hospitality headlines you need to know, shining a spotlight on the cookie brand that turned a chocolate chip recipe into a billion-dollar empire, exploring why hospitality might be the smartest customer acquisition tool hiding in plain sight, and I've got a spicy take on the cheapest marketing move most small operators are sleeping on. Let's get into it.

In today’s email: 1,100 Cookie Stores in 8 Years, Hospitality Is the New Front Door & The £100 Marketing Hack

Read Time: Approx 3-4 mins

We take a look at some of the hottest headlines happening right now in UK Hospitality.

Sources: Propel Info, MCA Insight, Restaurant Online

🔥 INDUSTRY UNITES BEHIND VAT CUT PETITION: The sector is rallying behind #VATsTheProblem, the campaign calling on the government to cut hospitality VAT to 10%, in line with much of Europe fronted by chef Tom Kerridge and already backed by major trade bodies, it has gathered tens of thousands of signatories ahead of a consumer launch on 1 July, with a target of one million.

🔥 UK HOSPITALITY DOMINATES THE SUNDAY TIMES 100: A strong showing for the sector in this year's list of Britain's fastest-growing private companies - Wingstop was again crowned the UK's fastest-growing restaurant group and made the biggest hiring commitment on the entire list; healthy-bowl concept Atis, SushiDog and London lunch favourite Farmer J all made their debut on the list, while food hall operator Blend Family, crumble sensation Humble Crumble and Thesleff Group rounded out a bumper year for hospitality.

🔥 EXCITING INDEPENDENT GROWTH: Soho House founder Nick Jones is opening all-day restaurant Café Clement on 16 June with former River Café head chef Danny Bohan; Dishoom co-founder Amar Radia has teamed up with two-Michelin-starred chef Andrew Wong for a "grand East London pub and Chinese kitchen" in Shoreditch; Edinburgh vegan institution Hendersons opens a Glasgow sister site this summer; neighbourhood café and wine bar Stubby's launches in Parsons Green next month; and cult focaccia spot Focaccia Mia has announced a second site in west London

🔥 GLOBAL BRANDS BETTING ON THE UK & IRELAND: US burger brand Shake Shack confirmed Reading as its 20th UK site and is in talks for London Paddington; Popeyes made its Ireland debut in Dublin, targeting up to 500 Irish jobs this year; Sides - the Sidemen brand opened its first Scottish site in Glasgow with 15 more planned for 2026 and Rome's tiramisu specialist Merisu is closing a UK master-franchise deal, eyeing 20-30 sites

I am sure everyone (myself included) has had the idea of starting a cookie shop for fun but it is a tough market. Loads of people doing it! When I heard about Crumbl, I was genuinely intrigued to learn more about how they’ve built a cookie empire.

In 2017, cousins Jason McGowan and Sawyer Hemsley opened their first bakery in Logan to create the world's best chocolate chip cookie. Neither of them had a background in baking, so they spent 4 months asking everyone and anyone for feedback on their cookie recipe. Eighteen months later, they had 21 stores. Coming out of the pandemic, they were opening roughly one new location every single day.

The Numbers That Tell The Story:

Here's what they're doing differently:

🎨 The power of brand and marketing - Ok so I work in the packaging world and know how impactful an unboxing experience can be, the sheer excitement and joy it brings. Crumbl designed their iconic 4 pack boxes in 2018 and has become one of the most recognisable bits of packaging in the industry. Celebrities and influencers began unboxing weekly flavours in viral videos, turning every purchase into a free marketing moment - generating organic exposure valued in the tens of millions. Anyone can create a great cookie, it’s much harder to create a great brand!

📅 The weekly drop - Crumbl looked over at the fashion industry and saw the insane hype and demand that weekly, one off drops would drive. They thought, why not apply that to the hospitality sector, drawing hype and scarcity to drive big queues. They have a rotating weekly menu of six flavours to manage demand and maintain quality. It also created anticipation for a Sunday flavour reveal every single week, that gained big traction on socials.

🏗️ Test and Reiterate - Crumbl have around 50 sites with built in test kitchens. Every new flavour and idea they have, they launch in their test sites to see if the demand is there. They can then hear customer feedback directly and iterate flavours to make the best cookies possible. Customers also can take photos of their cookies and rate them directly on the app, so Crumbl know which flavours are performing well.

For those of you who have tried Crumbl, what are your thoughts?!

So, this may sound strange but I get my coffee at a nail salon. Right by my office sits a coffee shop called ‘Cona’ - stands for coffee and nails. I just like their coffee but it’s actually a smart customer acquisition play.

You go in for a coffee on your first visit and then notice they have a nail a bar, by the second visit, you're booking a manicure and sipping another coffee while you wait.

This format can be applied to other sectors, for example:

The pattern is the same: hospitality lowers the barrier to entry. A coffee gives people a reason to walk through a door they might otherwise walk past.

It's underused, especially in sectors built on considered, high-trust purchases - real estate, wellness, professional services and even car showrooms.

Trying to run a small hospitality business is hard enough and trying to find time and money to put into marketing feels like a huge task. If all I had was £100 to spend on marketing, I’d honestly buy a good clip on mic and leverage founder led content as well as POV style footage. Customers are so intent on understanding the people behind the business and the founder story. I think it could be the biggest ROI out there! If you had £100 to spend on marketing, what would you do?

That wraps this edition of Hot Potato. Now I want to know what are you guys actually enjoying reading about? Brand playbooks, what’s going on in the industry, trends or anything else!

Hit reply with any thoughts - I read everything and it genuinely shapes what comes next.

Bon appétit,

Max Shipman, Founder, Hot Potato

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