When Little Chef
finally ceased trading back in 2018 it was the end of an era and a
rather anticlimactic ending to these
Dine Out Before They Die Out posts, I had set out to visit/
dine at as many Little Chefs as I could before its fateful closure,
“
At least I was able to document some of them” I thought, then
last month a former employee of Little Chef Adrian Atkins very
kindly reached out to me. Adrian started working for Little Chef in
1979 at Sinderby as a weekender. When he left school the following
year he worked at Weyhill Little Chef as a General Catering Sales
Assistant then in 1981 he moved on to Little Bentley as a Supervisor,
a Deputy Manager at Hornchurch in 1982 before becoming Deputy
Manager and later Regional Staff Trainer at East Horndon in 1983.
Having discovered a talent for teaching he decided to train as an
infant school teacher and officially left LC in 1988 to train but he
returned to LC during the summer vacations of 89, 90 and 91 to assist
with new openings or act as a relief manager. He told me that it felt
like, “
A proper vocational calling and I still love it, but I also
still look back on my LC days with fondness and pride” and quite
rightly so! Adrian has very kindly
agreed to become my first 'Guest Blogger' and recount his time with
Little Chef offering us a fascinating insight of what the chain was
like between 1979 to 1991.
When I started with LC
it was owned by Trusthouse Forte, one of the biggest hotel and
catering companies in the world at that time. There were nearly 200
branches at that time and as part of THF it meant they had access to
excellent head office facilities, estates and maintenance teams and
THF's own food supply company (Puritan Maid) which manufactured foods
specially for LC use only. The sites at that time
were well looked after and attractive. The menu was relatively simple
as the only cooking equipment was griddles, fryers and a bain marie.
The typical menu of this time consisted of 3 starters, 3 breakfasts,
a range of grills and steaks, a range of burgers, the famous LC
pancakes and a few other deserts such as cakes and ice creams. 2 of
LC's unique selling points at this time were the fact that all food
was cooked in full view of the customers and they were the only chain
to have a dedicated children's menu. Opening hours were then 8am til
8pm but these were extended in 1981 to 7-9 and then in 1982 to 7-10
with some sites operating 6 - midnight. A typical site would be
staffed by a Manager, Deputy Manager, Supervisor and a team of
General Catering Sales Assistants. Smaller sites sometimes didn't
need a supervisor whereas larger sites often had two supervisors.
- Management
were trained at regional training centres but GCSA's were trained at
their own site. The training was of an extremely high standard and
consisted of a six week induction covering health and safety, food
hygiene, customer service, kitchen prep, beverage service and griddle
cooking. As more new sites opened over the next decade opportunities
for career progression were plentiful.
REGIONAL MANAGERS - LC
had a deliberate policy of making sure each RM had no more than 10
sites as this allowed them to get into every site on a weekly basis
and to build up a really personal relationship with all the staff.
The main duties of RM's were to set the sales targets for each site,
to set the wage budgets, to carry out monthly housekeeping checks and
to undertake yearly appraisals for all members of the management team
at each site. They also organised fantastic social events in each
region and sometimes ran competitions where it was possible to win
great prizes such as a car or a holiday!!! All the benefits of
belonging to such a great parent company.
1985 - This was
probably the most exciting year to be part of the LC story as so many
great things happened. Firstly every single site had a complete
makeover and refurbishment with a great new look and really smart new
staff uniforms. Part of the refurbishment was the installation of the
Merrychef ovens which allowed for a much more varied menu to be
offered. Then we launched LC Lodge with the first four lodges opening
in this year. Next came the purchase of Happy Eater which THF decided
to still continue running under that name but brought in the same
sort of standards that LC had and put the HE sites under the command
of existing LC regional managers. The purchase of HE also included
four motorway service areas known as Welcome Break. As THF already
had a chain of service areas and they liked the name Welcome Break,
they extended it across their whole estate so that the former name of
Motor Chef was dropped. This also saw all of the service areas
undergo a complete refurbishment. THF had also just been offered the
chance to buy the small chain of Kelly's Kitchen roadside restaurants
which had been operated by Petrofina who had built them alongside
their petrol stations. These sites all had an identical design of red
brick cottage style with a large funnel type chimney. Because this
chain was so small and THF was already running two major roadside
brands it was decided to convert all of them into LC's.
STAFF TRAINERS - Until
1983 all training was under the supervision of a Regional Training
Officer but as the number of sites grew it became unworkable.
This was when regional staff trainers were introduced who were
responsible for all training in 10 sites close to their own base
site. To become a staff trainer I had to undergo an extensive
training course which was endorsed by the Hotel and Catering Industry
Training Board, produce some new training materials and be observed
carrying out training. Only when I had successfully done all this was
I awarded my certificate and badge.
1991 - In this year
Trusthouse Forte decided to slim down it's business which included a
massive 22 companies including sports shops, a cruise line and lots
of other diverse stuff. They now slimmed down to just their hotels
and restaurants. The name was also simplified to just Forte with a
brand new logo. The Forte name preceded other brands in all signage
and promotional material so that Travelodge became Forte Travelodge
and Posthouse became Forte Posthouse, etc. The effect of this on LC
was that the old roadside division consisting of Welcome Break, Happy
Eater and Little Chef was now disbanded and these three brands joined
Harvester and Wheelers to become Forte Restaurants. All of these
restaurants then displayed a large plaque inside the restaurants with
this branding and any new sites built after this got the Forte
Restaurants branding on external signage too.
COFFEE STOP - LC
regularly conducted nationwide customer surveys to see what modern
travellers wanted. Over the years this had led to longer opening
hours, many menu changes, complimentary newspapers, bigger retail
selection of goods, baby change facilities and the launch of LC Lodge
(later renamed Travelodge). It was one of these customer surveys that
resulted in the launch of Coffee Stop. These were small counter
service units built on to existing LC's to offer an alternative to
the table service model. Around this time LC Express was also
launched offering a takeaway service.
GRANADA TAKEOVER AND
THE SAD END - I have never ceased to be amazed at why Granada wanted
to get their hands on Forte and the way in which they launched such
an aggressive takeover bid. To my mind the rot set in as soon as they
took over. With LC in particular they made several huge mistakes. The
first thing they did was to do away with Coffee Stop and replace
those units with Burger King. Utterly ridiculous as the coffee market
was just starting to really grow then (look at Costa's success) and
anyway, LC already offered a good range of burgers. Granada also
immediately did away with the Happy Eater Brand and converted all
those sites to LC. They also converted their own smaller chain of
roadside restaurants (AJ's) to LC and opened up LC's in their
motorway services. All Of this was done hastily and in many cases
just consisted of a change of external signage, uniforms and menu.
This meant that the national look of LC was really watered down and
the traveller felt there was no choice anymore on the roadside. Add
to this a massive hike in prices and the number of RM's cut so that
each one now had 40-50 sites and the whole brand started to fall
apart. Five years later Granada offloaded LC to Compass and then in
the next 18 years LC went through another six owners, all of whom
stripped assets, failed to invest, closed sites, etc. And the rest is
history sadly.
A great, big THANK YOU to
Adrian for getting in touch and sharing his time with Little Chef
with us, not only offering an interesting glimpse into a now sadly
defunct and much missed part of British life but for offering a fresh
way of allowing us to preserve and share the memories of these
welcome breaks on this site. If you worked for Little Chef and would
like to share your memories please get in touch.
Previous Little Chef Sites:
©Arfon Jones 2021. All images are
copyrighted throughout the world.
