When Gemma Hampton-Stone was appointed as the new managing director for Bodean’s back in November last year, she was clear on her mission. “Looking forward to reviving this London institution,” she wrote on LinkedIn at the time. “Watch this space!”
There aren’t many restaurant groups that could be called an ‘institution’, but for Bodean’s it feels like a rightful moniker. After all, the smokehouse and barbecue restaurant brand has long been a fixture of London’s restaurant scene, having been launched by Canadian restaurateur Andre Blais in Soho back in 2002.
Positioned as majoring in Kansas City-style (KC) barbecue, which focuses on low-and-slow smoked meats, with a drinks list of imported US craft beers and bourbon whiskey, it was a brand that gained significant traction in its early years. Back in 2014, Restaurant described Bodean’s having ‘something of a cult following in London’. A flurry of further openings followed the Soho site, and at its height the group had eight restaurants across the capital.
It’s not all been easy grilling, though. Periods of expansion were followed by decline and extended hiatuses in growth. Blais eventually stepped away from the operational side of the business in 2020 to pursue other ventures, although he remains listed as a non-executive director. Today the group’s estate is half what it was at its peak with smokehouses in Soho, Covent Garden and Tower Hill, and a newly-established all-day diner concept in Camden (more on that later).
Facing challenges
Hampton-Stone joined Bodean’s having previously worked as director of operations for Rose Pubs Group, both brands falling into the portfolio of Solitaire Restaurant Holdings. Her appointment came about amid a downturn in revenue, which had led the group to recently close its restaurants in Fulham and Clapham. “I was already helping out here and there in a sort of non-executive role,” she explains. “And eventually the majority owner asked me to join the business properly.”
Bodean’s has over two decades of positive brand equity. However, it’s gone through quite a lot of changes in that time, which has seen it move away from the values that originally underpinned it and made it such an institution when it first launched
The challenges facing the brand were, in Hampton-Stone’s eyes, clear to see. “Bodean’s has over two decades of positive brand equity. However, it’s gone through quite a lot of changes in that time, which has seen it move away from the values that originally underpinned it and made it such an institution when it first launched.”
This related, primarily, to the food offer, which had dropped the emphasis on KC barbecue for a broader menu that brought in elements of Tex-Mex cuisine alongside an extended range of burgers, sandwiches and hotdogs. Like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, many customers had dawned that they weren’t in Kansas anymore.
“You flex too much, and you move away from your roots, and it becomes a confused concept for the customer,” continues Hampton-Stone, frankly. “Not to mention that quality did also drop over time, which comes from not having a strong figure leading the food direction.”
Enter Richard Turner. The steak savant has long been considered a leading authority when it comes to serving meat in restaurants – he’s worked with the likes of Hawksmoor, PittCue Co, and Blacklock in the past, is behind London butcher Turner & George, and is a co-founder of the Meatopia barbecue food festival. For Hampton-Stone, he was the perfect person to bring in and help return Bodean’s to its roots.
“I’ve always been with businesses that have that northern star, which keeps you going in the right direction and quiets some of the noise from external pressures that can lead to kneejerk reactions. That’s a big part of the reasoning behind wanting to bring Richard on board.”
Reviving the essence of KC barbecue
Compared to the more familiar Texas-style barbecue that’s synonymous with other UK-based barbecue restaurant brands including Hickory’s Smokehouse, Red Dog Saloon and Big Easy, KC barbecue centres on rubs and marinades rather than sauces. “It’s a drier barbecue,” says Hampton-Stone. “The style of cooking is low-and-slow, and because it’s a dry smoke you get a deeper penetration of flavour.”
When Bodean’s launched in the early noughties each of the restaurants had its own barbecue pit, but today this is handled via a central kitchen – a decision made by Blais in the early 2010s – that houses six hickory smokers. The central kitchen is run by a group of pitmasters who have been with the group since its inception and is where all the meat served across the Bodean’s estate is butchered and smoked before being vacuum packed and delivered to the restaurants.
It’s a significant operation and arguably too big given the size of the Bodean’s portfolio. Having that infrastructure in place, though, has helped dramatically with the development of the new menu, which Hampton-Stone and Turner worked closely on together between November and January. “We have six smokers, but we only need two to supply the restaurants, so we have lots of extra capacity, and that means there’s more opportunity to experiment and work with bigger cuts,” Hampton-Stone continues.
We’re reviving the essence of great KC barbecue and bringing the brand back to its roots
“In KC they’ll smoke anything. If it moves, they’ll smoke it. That’s great for us because it gives us a plethora of proteins to play with as the seasons go through and means we’re not completely reliant on pork and beef all year round.”
To that end, the new menu at Bodean’s, which launched last month, features a smoked turkey that’s served with a hot sauce butter. There are also plans to add fish options in the months ahead.
“We’re reviving the essence of great KC barbecue and bringing the brand back to its roots. We want to take the customer back on that journey and show them a different style of barbecue cooking that they may not be familiar with.”
Stripping back the menu
Turner and Hampton-Stone’s approach to the new menu was to strip it back and refocus it around a core range of smoked meats. Any dish not analogous to KC barbecue has gone including the nachos, quesadillas, the four-strong hot dog selection, and the extensive burger range.
Where once there was around 45 different dishes available across Bodean’s mains and starter sections, now there are 17. They include a short selection of starters including an American-style shrimp cocktail; potted smoked meats with grilled sourdough; and a chopped salad with smoked turkey, bacon, blue cheese, romaine lettuce, tomato, eggs and avocado. The ‘buns and burgers’ offering features a smoked brisket sandwich with vinegar slaw, pickles and barbecue mayonnaise; and a grilled cheeseburger made using a dry aged beef patty. While the four individual main plates include a 500g smoked Jacob’s ladder beef rib, a mainstay of the Bodean’s menu that’s now served with vinegar slaw, pickles and Texas toast; and a smoked and grilled chicken option.
The emphasis of the whole menu, however, is on the new Bodean’s barbecue platter. Available for either two to three people (£60) or three to four people (£85), the platter features smoked baby back pork ribs, Carolina pulled pork, smoked beef rib, Texas link sausage, smoked brisket, vinegar slaw, pickles and Texas toast. Diners can also add extras to the platter including the turkey in hot sauce butter and brisket burnt ends for an additional £6 each.
“We’ve stripped [the menu] back to what we do really well,” says Hampton-Stone. From our corner booth in the Soho restaurant, she gestures around the room. It’s mid-afternoon and while the dining room is quiet there are still five tables occupied, four of them eating platters. “For us, success is having more than 50% of orders be the platter. It’s our USP, the best of everything. No one has finished it yet, and that’s how it should be. You want to feel full and take some home.”
This last point is why Bodean’s dessert menu is so small, she adds.
Alongside the platter are a selection of sides priced between £4 and £10, which include poutine with fries, Carolina pulled pork, cheese curds and madeira gravy; barbecue beans; mac and cheese; onion rings; and an American-style potato salad with bacon, eggs and pickles. “It’s a feasting menu that can be shared by a couple, a whole family or a group of friends,” Hampton-Stone adds. “In my mind, that’s exactly what barbecue is.”
A ‘barbecue, bourbon and beer’ philosophy
Turner’s role as chef director not only saw him overhaul the food offering, it also led to a recalibration of its drinks menu and an embrace of Bodean’s original philosophy of ‘barbecue, bourbon and beer’. “As we were developing the food menu, we were also discussing ideas for the drinks,” says Hampton-Stone.
“Bringing back the American import beers, which underpinned Bodean’s back in the day, was a key part of that; as was expanding the list of bourbons.”
The beer selection is reassuringly serious without being OTT, with options that include a PABST Blue Ribbon 4.7% that’s available on draught for £6.50 a pint; a Sierra Nevada 5% pale ale 355ml can at £6.95; Stone Buenaveza Salt & Lime Lager from the US that comes in a 568ml can (£8.75) and a punchy 13.3% Oskar Blues bourbon stout, which comes in at £11.75 a can. Canadian lager Moosehead, which has been on the drinks menu since day one (it’s hard to find in the UK outside of a Bodean’s) is on the menu, but other beers such as Samuel Adam’s are no longer there.
The bourbon menu, meanwhile, includes 18 different US labels including a limited range ‘barrel strength’ option produced by Four Roses, which is available at £15 a shot and comes in at 54.1% proof.
We’re buying better now and not passing it onto the customer, so making that work is a big focus and challenge for us to negotiate in the next year
Turner has also seen an overhaul of the group’s food procurement practises, with all the meat now sourced from within Britain and using higher quality cuts – a benefit to the brand in the long term, but one that throws up its own problems. “Our menu is 98% protein and that’s an expensive item,” Hampton-Stone continues, noting that beef prices have risen 40% is the past two and a half years.
“We’re buying better now and not passing it onto the customer, so making that work is a big focus and challenge for us to negotiate in the next year.”
Plans are already in the works for further evolutions to the menu, which will begin to take effect in the coming months. “We can’t go back to where we were 20 years ago without taking it step by step. It will evolve over the next year, learning what works and what doesn’t as we ride out the cost pressures.
“There’s a strong foundation for Richard to build upon. It’s the perfect match. I just wish we’d done it ages ago.”
Expansion and other concepts
While the new Bodean’s menu is being served across the group’s Soho, Covent Garden and Tower Hill restaurants, the group’s fourth outpost in Camden has been positioned as a broader offering. Having launched quietly at the tail-end of last year, the Bodean’s Diner sits on the ground floor of The Camden Town Hotel, which is also part of the Solitaire estate, and serves a wider all-day offering more akin to Bodean’s old menu, alongside a range of breakfast dishes.
“We own the freehold of the hotel and had opportunity to put in an F&B option, and we thought it was a good opportunity to test out something different to what we were doing with the core restaurants,” says Hampton-Stone. “You can’t really do a smokehouse in the bottom of a four-star hotel. The two don’t go together.”
This might seem in conflict with the aim of going back to what Bodean’s does best, but Hampton-Stone views it differently. “It’s a good test bed for us, and benefits from having access to a good takeaway and delivery market too. If we were ever going to franchise any concept it would be that.”
Expanding the core smokehouse concept is also something the group is considering, albeit on the periphery. “With our pit capacity we could do 10 restaurants tomorrow, so we’re doing a disservice to the kit by not,” she says.
Any future growth will have to be well considered first, with Hampton-Stone pointing to previous mistakes in the group’s expansion strategy. “Poor site decisions meant we went from large to small estate very quickly,” she continues. “And we don’t want to do that again.
“Pre-Covid we had eight sites, and it would be great to get back to that, but we will only grow the brand at a sensible rate and when we’re sure that we can maintain the quality.”
There are other avenues being explored too, with at home experiences, office catering and wholesale all mooted - the company currently has a BBQ at Home offer where customers can order its BBQ pulled pork, baby back ribs, and beef brisket burnt ends via online meat supplier Sherwood Foods.
“We have plenty of levers we can pull. But for now, we’re focusing on our core brand and estate, and making sure the customer resonates with it.
“We don’t want to be just another restaurant chain, and any decision to grow has to be the sensible and logical thing to do.”