The founder of Mowgli Street Food has revealed her expansion plans for the fast-growing restaurant chain as the search for a major new investor starts.
Nisha Katona opened her first eatery in Liverpool in 2014 and now presides over an ever-growing network across the country.
Now a celebrity chef and having appeared on Masterchef, Cooking with the Stars and The Great British Menu, the former barrister has set her sights on opening up to five sites a year and has started considering expanding overseas.
In an exclusive interview with BusinessLive, the Ormskirk-born entrepreneur also revealed why it’s so important to her for Mowgli to still be headquartered in Liverpool, how it has survived the Covid-19 pandemic, her search for a new private equity backer and where she is planning to open a restaurant next.
READ MORE: Sales at Mowgli Street Food ‘significantly’ ahead of pre-pandemic levels
Mowgli Street Food is one of the biggest recent business success stories to come out of Liverpool.
The company has strong ties with the city as its founder practised law there before embarking on her new venture and she was also appointed chancellor of John Moores University at the start of this year.
The business also recently doubled down on its commitment to Liverpool by moving to a new headquarters with personal significance to Nisha.
But unlike sports apparel company Castore, which relocated its headquarters from Liverpool to Manchester last year, Nisha tells BusinessLive that it’s a move Mowgli would never make.
“I was a barrister in Liverpool and it’s my home city. Mowgli is national and all across the UK but I love that it was in Liverpool where the company was born”, she said.
“I just feel like this is where I got my first ordination and I’m not leaving this city. I will die in Liverpool so why would I want my head office to be anywhere else?”
Nisha Katona opened her first restaurant in Liverpool in 2014 (Image: Liverpool Echo)It’s an understatement to say that all hospitality businesses have had a tough time since the spring of 2020.
But with the pandemic restrictions being eased in the UK, companies are now having to face a cost of living crisis which is hitting their outgoings as well as their customer’s pockets.
But Nisha said that despite the pressures, Mowgli is surpassing its pre-pandemic financial results and has managed to keep its restaurants full by not passing on the rising costs to guests and keeping prices low.
She said: “We’ve exceeded our targets and it’s because of the beauty of building a brand in the North.
“Two of the main afflictions for the hospitality industry are the cost of living crisis and the issue of Brexit.
“Brexit means that you can’t recruit and if you can’t do that, you can’t do a full service and that means you make less money.
“The beauty of Mowgli is that we’re only about 15% European across the board, which is generally the pattern outside of London.
“In London, 90% of restaurant’s staff are European, or at least they were before Brexit. Now they just shut three days a week.
“Outside of London that’s just not the case so we have been able to stay open and offer a full service.”
Mowgli Street Food, St Vincent Street, Glasgow (Image: DAILY RECORD)She added: “On the cost of living squeeze – when your rent is ‘Northern’ and your outgoings are ‘Northern’ you’ve got more disposable spend.
“What we have found is that people have really honoured the High Street and people have gone out there and spent the money.
“The third thing that really matters is that we are a relatively cheap restaurant. We also don’t pass the cost of the increase in costs to our guests.
“There will be little tweaks but the minute we do that and the minute 15 year olds can’t come in and have their tea with their pocket money that will be the death of Mowgli.
“There are many reasons why people have still honoured us and you’re only as good as your last curry.
“We have exceeded our expectations and it has truly been extraordinary.
“The losses are ours and we don’t just pass them on to our customers and what happens is that you still end up with full restaurants because people can afford it.”
Mowgli is on the verge of opening a new restaurant in Preston, Lancashire, and already has sites in Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Oxford, Nottingham, Sheffield, Cardiff, Leicester, Leeds, Cheshire, Cheltenham, London and Glasgow.
It is also expected to open in Bristol, Edinburgh and Brighton by the end of the year.
Nisha also reveals that the company has identified a second site in Richmond, London, as well as in Knutsford and Beverley. Negotiations are also set to start over a potential restaurant in Bath.
Nisha said: “I basically choose red brick university cities and I’m now looking at a few interesting market towns where we think we will fit in.
“I build about four to five Mowglis a year and I can’t actually see a limit to it.
“When people call for us we go there and I’ve had people asking for us to come to Lincoln so that’s also something we are looking into as well.
“The minute people stop asking for us then I presume I will go back to being a barrister!”
Ed Gamble, Andi Oliver, Nisha Katona, Tom Kerridge starred in the latest series of the Great British Menu (Image: BBC/Optomen Television Ltd/Ashleigh Brown)“For every Mowgli I open I probably take on about 40 new members of staff”, she added.
“People can have a lot of disdain about the idea of a chain or the idea of ambition.
“Americans don’t have that but in Britain we’re raised to be ashamed of that kind of growth.
“But by becoming a chain we have been able to give over £1.2m to charity and create jobs in these locations that need them in an environment that you want your own kids to work in.
“If we opened one and it turned out to be a bit of a duffer I would slow down but so far we’re in the heyday of the brand which is amazing.”
Mowgli, St Martin’s Square, Leicester. (Image: Leicester Mercury / Chris Gordon)On whether she would consider taking her brand abroad, she said: “I would go overseas but I do think that we have a lot of runway in this country and I’m just starting to gently think about going to other countries.
“I would be very particular about where we did go overseas because I don’t think that every country will want Indian food such as France and Italy.
“Maybe The Netherlands, Germany and the USA could be places that we could go.
“But the amount of effort that it would take, especially now that we are out of Europe, to start up in a new country would be sizable and then how many could you have there?
“You might only be able to have three so it’s about how knackered do I want to be to launch something into a country where we can only have three restaurants.
“But right now I have to find somewhere in Cambridge and Newcastle and I’ve got my plate full here, really.”
Office workers Tiffin at Indian street food restaurant Mowgli (Image: Manchester Evening News)Mowgli Street Food is currently backed by private equity group Foresight and has helped support Nisha as her restaurant chain has expanded across the UK.
However that could be about the change as she revealed plans to search for a new backer to “take us on to the next level”.
She said: “It’s absolutely right that Foresight will exit the business. These things have a lifespan and we’ve had such a great time with Foresight but it’s time to find a new partnership.
“It’s now been four or five years and it’s time to look for that next marriage partner.
“We’ve started to have some interesting conversations but the truth is people have never stopped coming to our door which is really amazing.
“I’m in absolutely no hurry as the most important thing is to find the right person.
“What will happen is that when we get around the table with whoever it is and you instantly click or you don’t. You have the same vision, or you don’t.”
Nisha Katona quit her job as a barrister to start her own business (Image: Liverpool Echo)On the growth that the business has seen over the last eight and a half years, Nisha said: “When I first set out I was so unsure of what I was doing that I took a two-year break on my first lease because I thought I would be chucked out by then.
“I also still design every Mowgli that if we stopped serving curry we could put coffee in. That’s how insecure I was at the beginning.
“I always build them very naturally and there’s nothing about them that screams Indian restaurant.
“I thought I would only have one restaurant but by the time I opened the doors the queue was around the block which was just a miracle.
“After day four people started to make offers to invest but I didn’t take anything until year three.
“It was a year later that I got my second restaurant in Manchester.
“I’m not going to go and sit on a yacht and it’s not about the bottom line. I want to carry on working at Mowgli and my ambition in life is just to have three meals out a week if I can, that would be amazing.
“It’s about enriching the cities that we go to.
“I have another job that I can go back to but there is nothing more fulfilling than creating your own restaurant.”
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