{"id":5528,"date":"2018-12-17T07:14:14","date_gmt":"2018-12-17T07:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/restaurant-insolvencies-jump-as-diners-stay-at-home\/"},"modified":"2018-12-17T07:14:14","modified_gmt":"2018-12-17T07:14:14","slug":"restaurant-insolvencies-jump-as-diners-stay-at-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/restaurant-insolvencies-jump-as-diners-stay-at-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Restaurant insolvencies jump as diners stay at home"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div property=\"articleBody\">\n<figure class=\"media-landscape has-caption full-width lead\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><\/p>\n<p>                <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"js-image-replace\" alt=\"Burger\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/320\/cpsprodpb\/308F\/production\/_104013421_menu3.jpg\" width=\"976\" height=\"549\"\/><span class=\"off-screen\">Image copyright<\/span><br \/>\n                 <span class=\"story-image-copyright\">Gourmet Burger Kitchen<\/span><\/p>\n<p>            <\/span><figcaption class=\"media-caption\"><span class=\"off-screen\">Image caption<\/span><br \/>\n                <span class=\"media-caption__text\"><br \/>\n                    Gourmet Burger Kitchen said it would shut 17 sites<br \/>\n                <\/span><br \/>\n            <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"story-body__introduction\">The number of restaurant businesses becoming insolvent jumped by a quarter in 2018 as consumers shunned the High Street, new figures show. <\/p>\n<p>Accountancy firm Moore Stephens said there had been 1,219 insolvencies, ranging from standalone restaurants up to large investor-backed chains &#8211; up from 985 in 2017.<\/p>\n<p>It blamed overcapacity at a time when Britons are eating out less.<\/p>\n<p>Restaurant critic Jay Rayner said more operators could struggle next year. <\/p>\n<p>In 2018, a spate of big restaurant chains were forced to strike rescue deals &#8211; known as company voluntary arrangements (CVAs) &#8211; with their creditors as they faced unsustainable debts.<\/p>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-42923499\" class=\"story-body__link\">What\u2019s eating the restaurant trade?<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-43104488\" class=\"story-body__link\">Jamie Oliver in talks to sell restaurants<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Gourmet Burger Kitchen <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-45962981\" class=\"story-body__link\">earmarked 17 sites for closure<\/a> while <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-44315826\" class=\"story-body__link\">Carluccios is shutting 34<\/a> outlets. Prezzo said it <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-43515133\" class=\"story-body__link\">would close 94<\/a> &#8211; about a third of the chain &#8211; including all 33 outlets of its Tex-Mex brand Chimichanga.<\/p>\n<p>Moore Stephens said that insolvencies were at their highest level since it began tracking the sector in 2010. <\/p>\n<p>It blamed an influx of private equity investment that had led to some restaurant chains opening too many sites that were now failing to break even.<\/p>\n<p>It also said interest rate rises and Brexit concerns had &#8220;put a dent&#8221; consumer spending growth, as operators faced rising overheads such as the minimum wage and ingredient costs.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"story-body__crosshead\">&#8216;Stalled&#8217;<\/h2>\n<p>Head of restructuring and insolvency Jeremy Willmont said: &#8220;Restaurants have always been prone to high failure rates but vacant restaurants used to be rapidly replaced by a new contender. For now, that process seemed to have stalled and many sites are empty.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Under such tough trading conditions, restaurants should be cautious about building up debt. They can very quickly become overextended as costs continue to rise.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Restaurant critic Jay Rayner told the BBC that many restaurants &#8211; and particularly mid-market chains &#8211; operated on &#8220;extremely tight profit margins&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They might be worth a lot but their margins are so tight that they are subject to real pain if there are sudden changes in the market place.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>He said that while an independent, standalone restaurant might be able cut its costs and struggle on, investor-backed businesses had to cut their losses fast.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t believe in crystal-ball gazing, but I think the last few months of the year will be good for restaurants, but in January many are going to find themselves staring down the barrel of Brexit. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think we could see a lot more businesses go to the wall and a lot of jobs lost.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/business-46571992\">Source<\/a> by <a href=\"\">[author_name]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image copyright Gourmet Burger Kitchen Image caption Gourmet Burger Kitchen said it would shut 17 sites The number of restaurant businesses becoming insolvent jumped by a quarter in 2018 as consumers shunned the High Street, new figures show. Accountancy firm Moore Stephens said there had been 1,219 insolvencies, ranging from standalone restaurants up to large &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":3577,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3577"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}