Plan · Ongoing support
Restaurant and pub opening support
For first-time owners and career changers who want to open once, and open well.
£495 a month. Three-month minimum, then monthly until you open. No VAT added to your invoice.
How do you avoid expensive mistakes when opening a restaurant?
Get the numbers right before you sign anything. In my experience, the most expensive opening mistakes are made before the doors open: a lease signed before the figures work, a budget with no cash left for the first six months of trading, a kitchen built for the wrong menu, and an opening date set before the licence, the team, and the suppliers are ready. Test the idea, then the site, then the plan. Spend money last.
Plan is how I do that with you. It is Atelier Sawyer's monthly pre-opening service for people opening a restaurant, pub, bar, or café in the UK: a working partner from the first idea to the first service, so the expensive lessons are learned on paper rather than with your savings.
Before you sign anything
- You have found a site and the agent is pressing you for an answer.
- Your budget covers the fit-out, but you are less sure what happens after opening night.
- The menu is clear in your head, but nobody has costed it.
- You are not sure which licences you need, or how long they take.
- Friends and family have told you it is a brilliant idea; nobody has told you what could go wrong.
- You have run a business before, but never one that opens at six and closes at midnight.
If any of those are true, you are at exactly the right point to get help. Problems cost far less to fix on paper than after you have signed.
The most expensive mistake happens before you open
It is usually the lease. A rent that only works if you are full every night; a personal guarantee you did not notice; a rent review, a break clause, or a repairing obligation that nobody explained. Once it is signed, everything else has to work around it.
Plan starts there. Before you commit, we check whether the site can make money at a realistic level of trade, not an optimistic one. If it cannot, I will tell you, and that conversation will be the most valuable thing I do for you. I will also give you my view of the lease as an operator: how its terms could affect your ability to grow, adapt, or change direction later. It is not legal advice; that is your solicitor's job, and I am happy to work alongside them.
How Plan works
Month one: testing the idea
We start with the questions that decide everything else. Who is this for, and are there enough of them nearby? What will they spend, and how often? What does the site cost to run, and what does it need to take each week to cover that? By the end of the month you know whether the idea works on paper, and what has to change if it does not.
Months two and three: building the plan
Next, we build the business you will actually open:
- The opening budget, with working capital for the first six months of trading
- The menu, costed dish by dish and priced to make money
- The kitchen and bar layout, checked against the menu before the builders start
- Suppliers, chosen on quality, terms, and reliability
- Your licensing and registration timeline: premises licence, personal licence, food business registration, and the order to do them in
- The team you need, how to find them, and how to train them before opening
- The systems: rota, stock, cash-up, and the till, set up before the first service rather than after it
- The launch: who needs to know you are open, and when
Until you open
Openings slip; builders, licences, and landlords see to that. After the first three months, Plan continues monthly for as long as you need it, so you are never paying for a long contract you do not use.
After you open
The first months of trading are where many new venues get into trouble. When you open, you can move straight onto Run without the intensive first month; I already know the business, and we carry on from where we are.
What is included
- About half a working day a month, on video or in person
- A tested concept and a site assessment before you commit
- An opening budget and a cash forecast for your first year
- Menu costing and pricing
- A licensing, registration, and opening timeline
- Supplier, recruitment, and training plans
- Systems set up before you open: rota, stock, cash-up, and till
- WhatsApp and email seven days a week: replies within four hours between 07:00 and 20:00, email the same day
- Templates and checklists that stay with you
Why work with me
I have spent more than 30 years in restaurants, cafés, bars, pubs, and nightclubs, as an owner and as an operator. I have opened seven venues of my own and several more for the people I worked for, and I know where first-timers trip up because I have tripped there too. I have turned round venues that others had written off, including the Sun Inn, which grew from £10,000 to £800,000 in annual turnover within thirty months. And I know what a lease can do: a clause I signed at 26 eventually cost me three pubs.
If you are coming from another career, your business instincts are an asset. Hospitality has rules of its own, and Plan is where you learn them before they cost you money.
What Plan costs
£495 a month. Three-month minimum, then monthly with 30 days' notice until you open. When you open, you can move onto Run and skip its intensive first month.
Prices are shown without VAT. Atelier Sawyer is based in Spain, so no VAT is added to your invoice, whether you buy as a business or, before you have formed one, as an individual. If your business is VAT-registered, you account for the VAT on your own return under the reverse charge.
Save British Pubs member? Your members' discount applies.
Plan is not right for everyone
- If you want someone to tell you the idea is brilliant, I am the wrong person. I will tell you the truth about the numbers, even when it is not what you hoped to hear.
- If you need someone to manage the builders day to day, you need a project manager or a fit-out contractor. I can help you brief and choose one.
- If you have already signed and open in a fortnight, start with a Pre-Opening Diagnostic. It is faster, and it finds what matters most in the time you have.
Not sure yet?
If you have an idea, a site, or a signed lease and want to know where the risks are, start with a Pre-Opening Diagnostic. It costs £695 and finds the problems before they are built in. If you start Plan within 30 days, the £695 comes off your first month.
Book a Pre-Opening DiagnosticFrequently asked questions
How much money do I really need to open a restaurant, pub, or café?
More than the fit-out quote. In my experience, first budgets cover the build and forget the months after opening, when trade is slow and costs are not. Budget for the fit-out, equipment, deposits, licences, opening stock, and training, then add a contingency for the build and working capital to carry at least six months of trading at a realistic level of sales. Plan builds that budget with you before you sign.
My fit-out is over budget and opening keeps slipping. What do I cut?
Protect what keeps you legal, safe, and able to cook: the kitchen, the extraction, fire safety, and accessibility. Delay what guests will not miss on opening night: a second bar, upgraded signage, the furniture you fell in love with. Never fund an overrun from your working capital; the first months of trading need it more than the build does. If the date keeps slipping, re-cost the first year before you spend another pound.
How long until a new venue starts making money?
In my experience, longer than the plan says. The first months are about building trade and fixing what the opening exposes, not profit. The more useful question is how long you can survive if trade builds slowly. If your cash runs out before sales reach break-even, the plan needs changing now, not after you open. A Pre-Opening Diagnostic tests that with you before you commit.
How long does it take to open a restaurant or pub?
Usually longer than you expect. Every food business in the UK must register with its council at least 28 days before trading. In England and Wales, a premises licence application then has a 28-day period for objections. Scotland and Northern Ireland run their own systems: in Northern Ireland, a new pub licence is granted by the county court, and an existing licence has to be given up for it. Plan sets out the order at the start.
Do I need a licence to open a café?
You must register as a food business with your council at least 28 days before you open. In England and Wales, you need a premises licence only if you sell alcohol, serve hot food or drink between 23:00 and 05:00, or put on certain kinds of entertainment. In Scotland, selling food between 23:00 and 05:00 needs a late hours catering licence instead. Plan covers which licences apply to you, and when to apply.
Talk it through
A free 30-minute call will tell us both whether Plan is the right fit. If it is not, I will say so, and I will tell you what I would do instead.