A planning application for a new drive-thru Tim Hortons outlet in Ballymena has been lodged with Mid and East Antrim Borough Council.

The plans would see the former Frankie and Benny’s restaurant on Larne Road Link turned into a  drive-thru café with outdoor seating, the Belfast Telegraph reported.

At present, the company has five outlets in Northern Ireland; on Belfast’s Fountain Street and at the city’s Connswater Shopping Centre as well as in Glengormley in Co. Antrim, Cookstown in Co. Tyrone and Coleraine in Co. Derry.

In February the Canadian firm revealed plans to open a further four outlets in NI and the Ballymena project would take the number of its cafés here into double figures.

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Added to the 14 stores across NI and five in Scotland the chain has now put down roots in Lancaster, with two more locations in the north of England opening during the summer months and new stores opening in Northern Ireland and Scotland before the end of the year.

Colin McClean, who founded Bob & Bert in Portstewart in 2013, said: “We’ve been shaking up the coffee shop industry everywhere with our simple commitment to serving customers proper coffee and great grub, and we’re delighted to launch Bob & Berts into England for the first time.

“We carefully select each of our locations and we’re confident the people of Lancaster will love what we have to offer.

“There’s no doubt that the last 15 months have been incredibly challenging for everyone in hospitality and with all of our stores in Northern Ireland now fully reopened, the team at Bob & Berts are excited to welcome our customers back.

“Safety measures such as floor markings, till screens and social distancing will still be in place, but we look forward to giving them the experience they’ve been missing for so long.”

‘Reason to innovate’

Two further stores will open in the north of England over the summer, first in Kendal in June and then in Preston in July, with new stores also opening in Scotland and Northern Ireland before the end of the year, with locations to be revealed in the coming months.

During the pandemic, Bob & Berts also adapted to lockdown restrictions by creating its own app to enable its customers to order for collection and delivery while cafes were closed.

Director David Ferguson explained : “Bob & Berts took on the challenge of lockdown and used it as a reason to innovate and find new ways to keep serving our customers. The development of our app and online system presents long term opportunities that we hope to develop even as we welcome customers back to our stores.”

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The Distillery Café is inside the same building in which The Copeland Distillery has been producing its spirits range since August 2019.

While it’s operating a takeaway service only for the moment, in-line with current restrictions, the venue does offer seating for 12-15 customers indoor and out. Guests and their dogs will have the opportunity to soak in the beautiful views of the neighbouring coastlines and Copeland Islands and watch the Distillery team hard at work mashing, distilling and cask-emptying.

Copeland transformed a derelict movie house in the centre of Donaghadee into its now permanent home, signing a 125-year lease and investing more than £900,000 into the project.

The Copeland Distillery was expecting to welcome thousands of domestic and international visitors this past summer in what would have been its first tourism season, but unfortunately had to close its doors to the public due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Founder of The Copeland Distillery, Gareth Irvine, says that despite the challenges, however, the distillery has been doing its best to thrive:

‘While it’s a positive step forward from a business perspective, we never intended that we’d have to sell takeaway coffee to keep our doors open to the public,’ he adds. ‘We’ve always wanted to do a café of sorts but certainly one that offered cocktails and our classic serves.

‘While it’s just takeaway for now, I’m a huge dog lover and dogs are a huge part of Donaghadee life, so we’ll be making sure we continue to be an inviting and comfortable place for dog owners and walkers as we expand the offering.’

The Distillery Café is open from Wednesday to Sunday, 9:00am to 4:00pm.

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It was a bad car accident in 2003 which led to Peter McCleery’s retirement from the NI civil service and his wife, Emma, who also worked for the government, decided to leave at the same time.

During his convalescence, forty-nine-year-old Peter found himself occasionally visiting coffee shops and pubs and he began to think that hospitality might be the business opportunity that he was after. Peter talked to his father, Marshall McCleery, who was involved in selling coffee around Ireland with the Hot Coffee Company, and eventually, he and Emma decided to open their own coffee shop.

An initial foray into Belfast city centre in 2005 was unsuccessful when plans to secure premises in the Botanic area fell through, but in April 2006, the couple opened the shutters at Sugarcane in Comber.

‘In Northern Ireland, we hear a lot about good food, but back when we were starting off, we did feel that some places really weren’t that friendly. We travelled around a lot and we found that in Europe, they took the job really seriously and so we wanted to bring a little of that European café culture back to NI. That’s what we did and I think that back then, we were ahead of the curve,’ says Peter.

‘Sugarcane accommodates about 40 to 50 people and when we first opened, we were more of a coffee shop, doing very light lunches,’ recalls Peter. ‘Then, over the next couple of years or so, we added a restaurant licence and a drinks licence and really went about developing the food end of things. Nowadays, we are known much more for our food.

‘In fact, Sugarcane really does fall well into the category we won at the LCN Awards, we are a coffee shop with a bistro element. We have a bistro menu in the evenings, but it’s casual dining, we stay away from the fine dining end of things, that’s not what we are about. This is about good quality, locally-sourced food, reasonable prices and service with a smile,’ Peter tells LCN.

One thing that Sugarcane is well known for in the north Down area is its breakfasts and sizeable queues are a frequent site at the venue on weekend mornings – everything is available, from traditional fry-ups to healthy alternatives and even an Australian-style breakfast.

In February this year, Sugarcane underwent a major refurbishment programme that included new décor, lighting and crockery, so the venue looked its best when LCN’s mystery shoppers arrived for their inspection.

Peter says that he and Emma and the staff were ‘over the moon’ with the win:

‘We really hadn’t expected it,’ he adds. ‘We knew we were up against some pretty tough competition, a lot of places that we would consider to be much bigger than us, but at the end of the day, it comes down to our core focus on the customer, I think, and the friendliness that there is in the shop. Customers are treated like individuals and some of them are really good friends.’

Peter also says:

‘For us, the LCN Awards are probably one of the most prestigious awards to win because of their mystery shopping element. We have been in for a lot of awards over the years, but I think at the end of the day, LCN is one of the best because of that secret diner aspect.’

As for priorities, Peter says that consolidation remains a key objective:

‘There are over 1000 new homes being built in Comber over the next couple of years. It’s definitely busier here than it used to be and new competition is opening up to. That’s fine, the more places there are in a town, the more attraction it has for people to come.’

At this point, there are no plans to open a second branch of the successful brand and Peter does say that within the next few years, he’d be keen to step back a little from the daily running of the Comber outlet, transferring more of the responsibility to a trust senior management team.

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