Hawksmoor was founded by friends Will Beckett and Huw Gott in 2006 and the pair now have 10 restaurants in the UK. From humble beginnings in a former Turkish restaurant in London, Hawksmoor generated sales of more than £90m in 2023 and is now expanding overseas.

In this episode of Business Leader, Dougal Shaw looks at the story behind a culinary and business success. “People don’t like being miserable," says Beckett. "One of the joys in life is spending time with people in restaurants."

Beckett and Gott are childhood friends and lifelong foodies. Their parents also worked in the food business. In their mid-twenties the co-founders ran several London bars. These didn’t take off, but it taught them valuable business lessons about hiring and venue location.

They hit on a winning formula with Hawksmoor, realising that there was a gap in the market because steak meals were associated with French bistros or American-style diners: “In a country really famous for beef, there wasn’t a British restaurant, that idea of Britishness made a difference."

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Hawksmoor: How to build an award-winning restaurant chain from scratch