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The Grateful for Hospitality Podcast features candid conversations with founders, operators, and experts shaping the sector. Practical insights, honest stories and ideas to make you think.
Ace Pizza as as a name started off in that kind of takeaway model and that home model of what people were doing in the pandemic. And people loved it, and it really kinda gave the identity it needed. And then the doors opened, people came back, and Ace was born. Pizza is the core for us. The dough is paramount.
Tom:If we get that right, then everything kinda follows. We try and use technology in a way to support. I think it's really easy to get lost and say this piece of QR code, etcetera, will do everything that you want it to do. We're trying to hold on to some of the kinda more traditional ways of looking after people. There's a reason more and more people are getting into pizza kitchens.
Tom:It's a really good business model, and what we've chosen to do is elevate that experience and add more variety to it with the rest of the menu. I always describe the pub as pizza and pints, whereas the restaurant very quickly became more about pizza and cocktails with a great wine offer.
Mason:What's the weirdest cocktail concoction that's been brought to your attention?
Tom:It's 100 the Parmtini. So we have a Parmesan infused vodka martini.
Mason:Hey, guys. Thanks for tuning in to the Grateful for Hospitality podcast. I'm Mason, one of the cofounders of Grateful. We're about to sit down with Tom Harrison, one of the cofounders of Ace Pizza, arguably one of London's hottest new pizzerias opening in the last twelve months. Situated in Victoria Park, we're talking about the journey of starting a pizzeria with your partner, the highs and lows of starting a bricks and mortar location of hospitality, and everything in between, like extravagant pizza toppings and hot honeymugs.
Mason:Stay tuned for the episode. Tom, welcome. Thanks for coming on the Grateful for Hospitality podcast. I appreciate you joining us today.
Tom:Thanks for having me. No. No.
Mason:It's all good. I think today, I wanted to discuss your story, your partner's story. Obviously, you're one of the founders and owners of Ace Pizza, an upcoming brand in London that people are talking about a lot. Obviously, you're a grateful customer. Getting into the weeds of the things that gone behind the scene of starting a hospitality business, what pizza means to you, experimentation, and everything in between.
Mason:Great. I think the first thing to go through is you've had an interesting story from hospitality to tech back into hospitality. And I know you've said before coming back into hospitality on your own terms has been something that's really important to you. Like, what what was what was the reason for that for that change?
Tom:Hospitality was was most of my kind of late twenties to mid thirties. It wasn't it wasn't what I trained to do. It wasn't what I studied to do. I've actually had quite a desperate career, and it took me a long time to figure out how to tie those things together. And throughout all of that, there was hospitality in the background, and it ultimately became the career.
Mason:Mhmm. Like most people.
Tom:Yeah. I think at a time when at a time when I was, yeah, I wasn't I was following what I wanted to do, say, in more creative aspects, and ended up in senior positions and ops positions and management positions in in pubs, in breweries, owned pubs, led ops on microbreweries, etcetera, started a brewery even. I'm working generally working with or the or for other people, and that took its toll. I think the the reason to leave hospitality was very much about value and a value piece and how was not just monetary value. How was I valued?
Tom:How was I looked after? And to be honest, I was probably burnt out and quite, like, quite unhappy, really, and started to play with this idea that I was gonna leave the job I was in at the time and leave hospitality altogether. That was a very clear distinction. We yeah. I set about kinda combining those disparate disparate feelings and and disparate careers to be to basically go out and look for generalist roles in in startups.
Tom:That seemed to be the space where I could tick all those boxes. Mhmm. But it also seemed like it was gonna be the space that was gonna give me that value that I needed. And then, yeah, went and had three three really strong interesting years in the tech space, which at the time, I don't know how much that informed well, I don't think I think I don't think it informed lots in my head at the time, but the more I've come away from it, the more I've kinda gone, oh, yeah. That that I learned loads in that or that.
Tom:I brought that through with me, or I'm so grateful for that experience. And it definitely informed how we wanted to set up as a business, especially in hospitality. We both come from long careers in hospitality, really, and both had good and bad experiences in there. So to bring through, like, a a different perspective was really important to us. But, yeah, to to jump back to hospitality was not a guaranteed one, but it definitely was, like you said, was gonna be on my own terms.
Tom:I think to go back and work for someone else was was a kinda definitely, like, line in the sand for me, really.
Mason:I think that that resonates quite well because talking about the start up environment and you've naturally just gone to the start up environment when you went to tech from hospitality. And there's even though you may not have worked in a start up environment within hospitality traditionally, there are some synergies there in the fact that it's so fast paced. The direction of travel can change depending on the wind and the weather. And I guess there's a lot of transferable skills that have come from working in a start up and being having that level of autonomy and adaptability
Tom:Yeah.
Mason:That have transferred through to to what you're doing now. Right?
Tom:Yeah. I think so. I think even the kind of shaping it as such and saying, you go into a start up and it's single digit employees and you you know you're gonna wear multiple hats. And that's exactly what's happening in those small independent businesses, restaurants, pubs, etcetera. I think the infrastructure is completely different, and that's maybe why it doesn't feel like a start up.
Tom:But every pub that we opened or restaurant, it is. It's exactly that. But it's not talked of in that way because maybe there's not that kind of tech bracket aligned with it. But, that that value piece going into a space my my view of startups is that they're all amazing, and I know that's not the truth. But the experience I had was was pretty exemplar, especially in terms of how the business was structured and built.
Tom:And I think that's something I wanted to bring back was I left hospitality for these reasons. So if we go back, how do we make it better for everyone?
Mason:Yep.
Tom:And we're still you know, we're figuring that out, really. And and it's not that it's not as easy as bolting on that infrastructure. It's a very different financial space. It's is it, you know, a difference between kind of corporate and and profit as opposed to, like, hospitality feels very, very different. Generally, the tech side in terms of the the technology we were using, the systems and setup, that that feels very different as a space in hospitality now than it did ten years ago, whether that's point of sale or whether it's what you guys do.
Tom:That that stuff seems to be catching up to each other. I think kitchens are very old fashioned spaces, and I think the same goes for, like, a lot of management in those areas as well. So that for me, I was like, we've got these tools. Let's use them. Let's use the right ones, not all of them, which if if I answered every cold email or anything like that, our subscription fees would be out out the the window.
Tom:But, yeah, lot lots of lots of stuff that it took me it took me in deep into this project to understand what I brought back from that space.
Mason:Yeah. And you've obviously talked about the things that you've brought back in. Like, what did it not prepare you for, like, you know, starting a pizzeria in London? There's obviously a lot of transferable skills like you just said from a from a startup perspective. What was, like, a big shock of, like, well, like, there's nothing that could've prepared me for this?
Tom:May maybe the blue sky thinking element of it. I've got all these new tools. I've got all these new toys, and this is how we're gonna apply them, and it's gonna be this kind of that exemplar experience is gonna be applied in in our restaurant, and no one's gonna touch it. And we're gonna we're gonna re rewrite the book kind of thing. And I think we went into it, or I certainly did, with that positivity.
Tom:It's not that there's been pushback. It's just that some things work a certain way because that's how they've always worked. And so to kind of enact change in a in a space or or a sector is is quite difficult. And and expect I suppose expecting that to work for everyone has probably been the question. And the question we're still asking, how do we how do we not overpromise?
Tom:How do we say this is the space and environment we wanna we wanna build, support, and work in? But you I realize you that that doesn't matter if that's just one way. It doesn't work. It needs to kinda it needs to have a relationship with that, whether that's staff, whether that's with suppliers, etcetera. The scope of the project, I think we've we've tried to build an infrastructure quite quickly.
Tom:That's probably a better infrastructure than we need, like, in terms of where maybe we might be focusing on some things now that we need to focus on with three sites, not one site. But I just mean, I think that means we're really well set up. We're set up for growth, I think. But, yeah, it's a lot of work. I think I don't know.
Tom:It feels it's definitely different to, like, strolling into Regent Street at 10:30 on a Monday and having a stand up and a coffee. Like, it's that's not to say we were it was lax where I was. It wasn't. It was a hard working environment, but it's
Mason:I was gonna say, what are trying to say about tech companies?
Tom:It's completely different. There was no slide. I was always disappointed. There was no, like, Google Slide or anything like that. Yeah.
Tom:No. Really, really great experiences, really great people. I think, definitely, I I always use that word exemplar when I describe that tech space for me because it was it was really it was really compassionate and empathetic and about how to look after people, how to provide a work life balance, and it ticked all of those boxes that I was looking for.
Mason:Yeah. I mean, I guess going back to transferable skills, you guys have got, you know, a really good tech stack, if I may say. Not just us, but, like, the whole piece that you're looking at. And I think that probably the importance of knowing of getting the technology right in a business even though it's a people business, I guess, like you said, has set you up for for scale, but also having the right foundations in place so that you can crack on and deal with customers or deal with your team in the right way, not worry about, you know, a manual process or or something similar.
Tom:Yeah. It's made us really it's made us kinda hypercritical of that stuff as well. I think there's I could go through my inbox now, there'd be two, three emails from saying, why you know, you need our booking system. We we take this much per cover, etcetera. Everyone's telling you they've got the next best thing.
Tom:Everyone's telling you they're gonna make your business better. And I'm always kinda pulled back to, like, there were restaurants before this space, this tech space, which makes me really critical and did in our initial research of all this all the software, all the kind of SaaS stuff that we looked at for good reason. And I think we've learned not to be reactive. Like, if we wanna implement something new, we'll stagger that in. That's been a really good lesson because you try and change something in hospitality overnight and react.
Tom:It's it causes it causes problems for everybody. But, yeah, I think, yeah, it's been good. That that's given me a lot of insight. It's almost re I'm always very tech savvy, but it kind of going into that space really bolstered that and really rounded it out. I think my my time was building a customer success team.
Tom:So although it was very kinda developer adjacent, it was very much on the customer service and customer success side and a an infrastructure and team around that. And it seemed it seemed to kind of what I've what I brought over is more like hypercoms. Like, I'm so it feels so natural to me now across email, across written copy, across personal relationships with with, you know, with guests and with staff, etcetera. It really bolstered all of that stuff. It kinda made me hypervigilant really about how we communicate with people.
Tom:And, yeah, I think the com the coms piece was is probably the biggest thing I pulled across from there. Mhmm. But but, yeah, we try and use technology in a way to to support. I think it's really easy to get lost and say this piece of QR code, etcetera, will do everything that you want it to do. And we're trying to hold on to some of the kind of more traditional ways of looking after people, not being over reliant on it, but getting the right fit for the right efficiencies in the business.
Mason:I think that's what people crave nowadays when they go into hospitality venue. You want to be looked after by someone that knows the steps of service or someone that can greet you and and really provide a memorable experience, but actually, like, knows everything about the restaurant to provide value when you're sitting down, not just be presented with a piece of technology and then have a human less or Yeah. Close to human less experience. So I think you're definitely on the right track there.
Tom:Yeah. I think we're still finding the right balance, but, yeah, instead of, like, figure this out for yourself, I think it's that the the feeling that is that if we get that right, that that that means more quality time with that guest Mhmm. Should do. Depends Yeah. How busy we are.
Mason:Yeah. Definitely. Just segueing to that point, obviously, because I know that you started Ace with your partner, Rach, didn't you? Tell me about that. Like, how how's that experience been for you so far 12 in?
Tom:It's been a lot. It feels longer than twelve months in that we what what are we on? May. We started out November was kind of the when we put an offer in on the Victoria Park site. Fast forward through legals till March completion, finalizing architectural stuff, contractors.
Tom:They went in in June. We opened in July. So it's it's an eighteen month process at the moment with ten months of active service kinda thrown in. We I think the way we talk about it is we we kind of founded the restaurant, owned the restaurant together, but Ace Pizza goes back kind of eight years or so. And Ace Pizza as a brand is very much Rachel's baby, and the intention was to to grow it together, and realize that it wasn't gonna happen.
Tom:It not that it wasn't gonna happen. I think it needed it needed two of us on the same page to drive that that forward and make a success of it, which we're we're hopefully doing and and continue to grow with the the restaurant side there. But, yeah, Rach set it up eight years ago. It was a the pizza offer in the Pembroke Tavern, which is a pub in Hackney Downs. It's, I think, over a 100 years old, this pub, and it was a I would I'd been in it prior to Five Points, the brewery purchasing it, and it was a good good old fashioned booze, a bit of spit and sawdust, and it did pizza.
Tom:So the Five Points used to their brewery originally was on this big intersection called the 5 Points where the Pembroke Tavern sits. If you haven't gone to the Pembroke Tavern, you should. It's a great it's a great pub. And the management there, the ownership the owner there, Ed, said, I want we've got let's elevate the pizza concept as well as the pub offer that we're doing. And that and he worked very closely with Rachel, and she went about setting that up, kinda conceived this menu, which over time developed into its own brand.
Tom:And and COVID, it kinda defines a lot of different things, but that was the the instigator for Ace Pizza as a brand. And it kinda started off Ace Pizza as as a name started off in that kinda takeaway model and that that home model of what people were doing in the pandemic. And people loved it, and it really kinda gave it the identity it needed. And then, you know, the doors opened and people came back, and Ace was born. It grew into a number of different pop ups.
Tom:So we me and Rachel actually go back years as friends and then together romantically in the last three or four years. And during that time, Ace had a number of different residencies and pop ups, which we started to wind down as soon as we started thinking about the restaurant. But but yeah. So so I'm late. I'm kinda late to the Ace party, but integral to the restaurant side of it, really.
Tom:But very much proud to say how, like, it's a female owned business. It's Rachel's baby. I'm I'm happy to make it work and and kinda help drive it forwards. But I'd like to think we couldn't do it without each other, but it yeah. It take it's it's a it takes a lot it takes a lot to get it done, but we get it done.
Mason:Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. And what what are you guys? Are you yin and yang?
Mason:Are you doing, like, very much the same thing and you just dive divert control of different things, or are you are you really good at some things that Rachel's less good at? Or how how does how does that work?
Tom:Rachel's good at everything. I I have to say that. That's that's the that's what she said before I came in here. No. And yang's really good.
Tom:I've not used that to describe it, but that's our yin and yang is front of house and back of house. Right. And I think that's the distinction in terms of what we go to naturally. So my background is is pubs, bars, beer, drink side, and Rachel's kitchens. And that's probably given us a really nice counterpoint where we're not we're not overstepping.
Tom:We both trust each other's interest in the other part of that space as well. So and we're both kind of foodies and and love food and drink, and that's a big part of our social life and home life as well. So I'd be more cook. Rachel would be more chef. It's that kind of thing.
Tom:Whereas and there's trust there as well. But, yeah, we, I think we naturally move into those areas, but we go back to what you said before. It's it's a many hats. It really is a many hats thing from bookkeeping to payroll to I was fixing a keg cup for today. I mean, it is it is a friend of mine said it's business ownership is 80% janitor, and that really rings true some days.
Tom:Mhmm. But, yeah, we it's very hard in an independent space where we've got so much riding on it, but we care so much about getting it right to not throw yourself into everything. And that's probably the spread we need to tag team more. We're learning better to tag team. Do we both need to be there today?
Tom:Because I think, yeah, there is a big crossover, big the Venn diagram of what we can both do is pretty big. But, yeah, there's natural natural escape where I'm like, that's that's yours. I'm not dealing with that, or I know you're gonna get that done maybe. But yeah.
Mason:It's good to have those boundaries, I guess, and and know. And I think the front of house and back of house thing is is is perfect. You know, like in a tech company, you get two cofounders or, you know, a group of cohort of cofounders. And if you've got ones that can complement others, you've got tech and you've got commercial, that's where the the real synergy works. And it sounds like you've got that transparently then through into into hospitality and and different things, so that's that's great.
Tom:I think that's why it works. I don't I don't think it was written that way or planned that way. That was may maybe one of the reasons that made it easy to make that decision to to go into it together.
Mason:And what was what was the defining moment, or what was the reason that you thought, right, we really wanna get a bricks and mortar location? If you're doing all these pop ups, and I'm guessing they all went really well in a vicinity in an area, and I'm guessing you would have had a massive uptick in COVID because people weren't able to to go out and dine out. Like, what was what was the moment where you thought, we want a restaurant. We want to, like, permanently put a flagship in for Ace Pizza.
Tom:I think Rachel had been thinking about it for a while. I think it had been bubbling under, and it maybe was keep going going back to COVID, but like a like a post COVID confidence thing. Like, I want to do this, but is it a is it a good thing? Hospitality is really difficult. Mhmm.
Tom:Is is it getting more difficult? Has it always been that way? But to take a I think peep some people probably thought we're mad, and and I can get why. And it's getting harder. It's harder to get into that space on a on a smaller sense as an independent.
Tom:But I think Rach loves that brand so much and loves the business and loves the best bit she can take from it that she wanted it was either make it succeed or, like, go and do something else. I think it was it wasn't that the pop ups or residencies were stagnant by any means. They're really successful. But there's probably a limitation to where she could take take that business, like, commercially, I suppose, as well in one way. And she needed that wider canvas, which the restaurant gave us.
Tom:I'd been nearly three years at the the Fintech startup. And
Mason:Still no sign of a slide.
Tom:Still no sign of a slide. Box ticking exercise. The reasons that I left hospitality, those value pieces, they were all ticked. But I think the last thing that wasn't ticked was was probably what what the day to day was, what we were doing. It it wasn't a sector or an area of interest that I kinda got passionate about or excited about in a way that I do with with hospitality, with relationships, with with kinda making people happy through food and drink.
Tom:But as, as we discussed, I'd to go back to that, would have to be my shop or someone else's shop that I'm connected to as opposed to going and working for someone again. And I'd actually made the decision actually, no. That's unfair. Rach had said to me, you're you seem like you're getting to the end of this piece. Like, you don't seem super happy with the day to day.
Tom:You know, the pay is good. The structure is good. All the other things around it are good, but you're not the nucleus of why you should be there isn't making you happy anymore. Mhmm. And looser looser form version of that, the longer decision that we made was, I think you let's get let's let's get a restaurant.
Tom:Like, let's think about what we wanna do. One of those things is making a success of Ace, and we went we were fortunate that we could kinda take a bit of a break. So I I finished where I was, and we took a bit of a a very mini sabbatical. We went down to Cornwall for I say a month. Rachel has three weeks, but I think it sounds better if you say a month.
Tom:And I think we were we were toying with the idea of leaving London, actually. It was kind of it was a bit of a marker. It wasn't to move to Cornwall, but it was to see, like, do we wanna live in a rural space? Are we happy in the city? And then two or three days in, I think it even we're in a really beautiful place, but it was quite evident what we missed about, you know, this great city that that we kinda get to live and operate in.
Mason:What was it that you missed most about London having been out of it for only three days? What was the pull that brought you back in?
Tom:I mean, weirdly, I think the the we had to drive to the shop, and I know that sounds tiny, but I could run out of there. I could run out of the driveway and go for a run-in this beautiful, like, old quarry, and that was amazing. But to be, like to do your normal daily amenities and have all of this stuff on your doorstep just wasn't there. It felt very isolating, actually. And suddenly, there's two of you in this space where you haven't got the things that you enjoy doing around you.
Tom:That enrichment was missing, which I think, you know, we're in the city because it it's full of enrichment. But that accessibility to it was a real, like, woah. That's I'm not ready to live in this kind of environment yet. So within a few days, it was kind of, yeah, we want we wanna live in London and stay in London. We've both been in London kind of fifteen plus years.
Tom:We're gonna that's where we wanna live. It's where our friends are. It's where our home is. And it it it wasn't quite the next sentence, but it wasn't far off. And Rachel said, well, we have to I have to make a success of Ace Pizza.
Tom:I have to get a restaurant. And we started looking at places that week in terms of where they might be. So that the property search even, the commercial search, started in in Cornwall. And, yeah, we came back and within that was July, and within a year, the restaurant was open. So it went in at first.
Tom:It happened. Yeah. So, yeah, that was the instigator, really. And I don't and I was looking at doing lots of other things as well and was doing bits of work along the on the side, but it would've it had to it had to be something like that. It had to be something really personal to come back and something that I could control and and influence.
Tom:Mhmm.
Mason:I wanna get into your mad experimentation of drinks and menus and things like that that we've talked about before, but I think just to go back to values piece, you obviously said you left hospitality for the values or their lack of. Yeah. What have you brought back for your team? Like, things that you know off the top of your head that you've done differently because you've experienced that negativity previously.
Tom:Work life balance, hours, contracts. I think the things that were really refreshing to see in that space of, like, oh, this is how it's done. This is what you meant to get. You know, proactive, progressive conversations with staff about pay, about reward, about bonus, about I think there's very much in hospitality because those that turnover is so you gotta protect it, really. It's it's difficult that you have one bad month and things can feel out of control.
Tom:And, yeah, I brought back a sense of I wasn't looked after very well, so I'm gonna look after I'm gonna make sure there's an environment that looks after our team. The interesting thing for me right now is how much how much of that actually goes in or or doesn't go in. I think we've spoken before about we can set the pay rate. We can set the trunk system. We can do all of this stuff to make a really nice positive environment.
Tom:Does it there is, like, an education piece in that as well for the staff. Do they know that's what they're getting? Is this their first job? Have they, you know, have they ever experienced a restaurant that might put them through sixty, seventy hour weeks? That's that's what I'm getting around to now, and that's understanding how we retain staff, develop them, but educate them as well on what we're trying to do.
Tom:I think that word had gone.
Mason:No. I was gonna say, do you think the times have changed since you were last in? I don't know. I know it's not forever and a day since you were last in hospitality, but with generational changes, with technology, with things like, you know, social media and review platforms for businesses, do you think that the market has just moved on slightly, or do you think it's still where it is and it's like operators really, really need to focus on these key fundamentals?
Tom:I think a bit of both. I think I think as a 41 year old and starting to feel a bit a bit older, but also that I think there's the cultural reference points when you'll drop a line from a film that six people in your team just
Mason:go, what
Tom:is he talking about? And then it's like, oh, that is this. This is the start of it now. But, actually, what we're dealing with with people most of our staff are in their mid to late twenties, and they were all 19, 20 during the pandemic. And, yes, that's we don't talk about those guys necessarily as the lost generation so much.
Tom:Sometimes it's the younger people, but they were just finishing their they were they were the ones that maybe had their second, third year of uni Mhmm. Online. And I think some of that is really positive because a lot of student a lot of young people come in with this they're quite protective actually of their time, of their rights, of what they expect, what they don't. So I think actually the the old the old work ethic has changed, and in some ways for for better in terms of people should be aware of that stuff, and they should own own that space. But it can't go it can't go too far the other way either, and that's that's the balance for me.
Tom:I I don't know how much generally the industry has changed because we're so hyper involved with it and heads down in our process. I think there's some people out there doing really great things, and I'm sure there's some people out there doing the same old things as well. But whether that's us taking out those clauses in your contract that waives you forty eight hours maximum, like, we have forty five hour contracts. No one works over that. If you work overtime, it gets spread across into the next week.
Tom:When we want if someone's like, I want sixty hours, it's like, you're not have that's you're not having it like it's policy, like it's contracted. So those certain protections, they might be simple, but they're at the forefront of our mind with how we're trying to look after people. Encourage holiday, like, why why it's important that you come back refreshed.
Mason:And given the mix it makes a difference, isn't it, as well? When you when you walk into a venue and someone's, like, really ready to go and they're providing a great experience, whereas someone that's worn out. Yeah. It can just set the tone for, like, a negative dining experience, can't it?
Tom:It's also I mean, even within a forty five hour week for people, it's it's it's at times, it's so crazy busy, and they're under a lot of pressure. So how do we energize them and keep them fresh? And it's a it's a massive it's a massive learning curve. And interestingly, someone we had an an ex interview with a really trusted member of staff who who who was with us from the beginning until recently and said, it felt like, you know, some of the stuff we wanted Blue Sky thinking first week, this is what we're gonna do as a business, felt overpromised. And it kinda it stung, but I totally agreed with it.
Tom:It wasn't an overpromise of we weren't lying, but the reality of trying to achieve the things we wanna achieve in terms of structure, culture in an in an incredibly busy space, that's the that's been the hardest thing for us to grasp recently. And it's like, we I'd say we're on that journey to that what we over promised, and we're on doing really, really good things. But we're not there yet, and that's that's all of these processes, all of these experiences, and all these people are informing that, which is really interesting. But it's it's a challenge. It's a real challenge.
Tom:I want I want us to set set a standard and be be able to look back and go look at what look at how we looked after people. Both sides, you know, not just guests. How do we look after the team? And hospitality is not really you know, it's not enough considered as a career, and we want people to come to ACE and stay with us and develop with us. A day
Mason:for life.
Tom:Yeah. Why not? Like, why not? You know, why shouldn't someone be with us for five, eight, ten years? It's too transient, and I think we're we're trying to instill things that maybe are at odds with how the business has been, the industry has been in the past.
Tom:And that that takes it just it's a it's a slow moving ship, I think.
Mason:Speaking of great things, tell me about your pizza.
Tom:Okay. So Rachel's the pizza queen. Yeah. But I know a lot about it as well. I'm a home baker, so I understand the bread and the dough, but I actually don't I don't I do make dough and I do make bigger.
Tom:So So we have a pre ferment. So if you think of a sourdough starter, that's a mix of water and flour with wild yeast. But a bigger is similar but different ratio. It's like a a shaggy dough mix with some fresh yeast, and it picks up some of the stuff in the the kinda local flora as well, we'll say. But what that does is it kick starts the fermentation process, and it adds flavor.
Tom:So that's the first part of the process of what kinda takes seventy two hours to get to your to your to your plate, to your tray.
Mason:So a pizza that someone's eating at Ace needs to be prepared seventy two hours beforehand. Yeah.
Tom:Right? Ideally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Tom:But, yeah, we dough dough is a massive dough is the pillar in the kitchen. We're open Tuesday to Sunday, and dough is made every day we're in service. Sometimes it's made on Monday if needed. Sometimes it's it's made double. But, yeah, the beaker is made.
Tom:There's some fermentation happens overnight. Next day, chefs will come in and make dough with that beaker. That is then, again, left left to kind of take in its surroundings, and then that will be refrigerated. It ferments, increases in size, and then the guys come in and they boil that dough. It goes back in the fridge for the next day.
Tom:So it's going through these three stages. That fermentation is actually giving it almost like a digestion. It's it's it's eating things that that's gonna add to the the final complexity of the pizza. And what we have is a bit of a hybrid. So Neapolitan, classic, very strict kind of rules.
Tom:That's not us. New York pizza, low slow bake, very kinda crisp, flat. That's also not us, but we probably if we lean one way, it's a bit more that way. But we we kinda say we're a bit of a hybrid. We're a bit in the middle.
Tom:So that fermentation gives it a really light, airy dough, which is really easy on the stomach, actually, but it's also got structure. So the initial concept was you need to hold a pint in your hand, and you can hold a slice of pizza at the same time.
Mason:So You stood at the back of the restaurant with binoculars, like, looking at all the customers making
Tom:Yeah. Well, it should never be a sloppy one. If we see a sloppy one in Ace Pizza, it's like, no. But, yeah, the pizza is the core for us. The pizza the dough is the dough is is paramount.
Tom:If we get that right, then everything kinda follows. Rach's both of us actually came from creative backgrounds, and I think that's informed informed a lot of what we do day to day. And that's where we I think we both get really energized when we get to apply create a creative mindset to what we do, and that's definitely Rachel's side with the food. We don't we take a few risks on certainly take risks on toppings and flavors. We don't try and follow traditions.
Tom:It's not it's not really what we've built. We try not to be too, like, derivative of anything. It's it's a bit like London. It's like a it's a hodgepodge of all of our experiences and likes. And, yeah, the drink side's similar.
Tom:We I always I always describe the pub as pints and pizza and pints. It's a very easy way to describe the model there, Whereas the restaurant very quickly became more about pizza and cocktails with a great wine offer. We still have great beer. We still sell loads of beer, but it's we sell loads more cocktails. It's like people come in, get a pizza and a hot honey margarita, and that was you know, even something like that was a we have hot honey.
Tom:Hot honey's we've had hot honey for years, honey, and it's but it's become part of the kind of it's in Waitrose magazine, and it's, you know, it's in it's in Leon sandwiches. It's
Mason:all you know,
Tom:hot honey's everywhere now, but we've been making our our honey hot honey pizza for six, seven years, and it was influenced by
Mason:Everyone's copy days pizza.
Tom:Great pizzeria. Well, we copied we copied Pauley G's in Brooklyn, so it's nothing's really original. You know? It comes from somewhere.
Mason:So where where is it where is it? Because we we talked about this very briefly. Where's where's hot honey come from? Because it you're right. It is the craze.
Mason:It is everywhere. And, you know, you go to a pizzeria now and you can get hot honey as a topping or as a side.
Tom:Yeah. My my view, and if there's any comments on this, correct me if I'm wrong. But where I where I think it comes from in terms of our influence, and I think it's where it comes from generally in pizza, is a Brooklyn pizzeria called Paulie G's, which was a guy called Paulie. Amazing slice shop in Brooklyn, and there's a couple of sites. And his friend Mike made hot honey, Mike's hot honey.
Tom:And he said, why don't we try this on a double pepperoni? And double pepperoni and hot honey was kinda born in that pizzeria, and it was became like a signature slice. So Rachel tried this, loved the idea, came back, was was, you know, Ace was growing, was becoming this entity, and she and so we created our pizza, the honey pie. So very much influenced by and then you start to see that pop up on other other things and menus. But, yeah, I don't think it quite appeared two years ago and suddenly was across supermarkets.
Tom:It's been a slow burn. So it's nice to know we're kind of ahead of the curve on some of that. But, we didn't we didn't create that. We just put our spin on it. The hot honey mug, we that was just why wouldn't we use that?
Tom:Why wouldn't we do a twist on a on a spicy margarita with the product we've already got on-site? So, yeah, we make all our hot honey instill or, infuse all our hot honey with chili on-site, and we make this, yeah, this kinda lovely spicy tequila bomb, basically, that people hit straight up. So but that's it. People get a pizza and a cocktail, and that that model really, really works for us. It's great.
Tom:So we get to experiment a lot on the drink side, more on the cocktails, really. That's probably where the creativity comes from.
Mason:And who's doing the creativity on the on the cocktail stuff? Obviously, had Rach's, like, back of house, your front of house. Like, where does this where does this sit? Whose realm is this?
Tom:It's actually with the team more than anything. I think a lot of stuff originally came conceiving ideas that we had. We worked with a really great drinks consultant, Lorkin. General manager, Lily, was very involved in that process early on. I think we had really good ideas already, but we weren't we're not cocktail specialists.
Tom:So, like, how do we how do we spec those, basically? But then we also worked hard on making sure that skill set was in the team. So for for most of the journey, we had a a really strong bar manager called Sarah who was just just very talented cocktail maker, very talented bartender, had a lot of experience, and was able to realize ideas for us as well as bring our own stuff to the table. And yeah. So we look I think we look to continue that and give give staff that freedom, make sure there's nice things on the shelf.
Tom:But for us, it's how do we how do you apply it to what Ace Pizza is? How do you apply it to what the menu is? Kind of pillars almost of if it doesn't feel very ace, if it doesn't reference a menu item or it doesn't yeah. It could be color. It could be an ingredient we use.
Tom:It could be a number of different things. If it doesn't feel ace, then it it doesn't go on. So there's, like, a there's a loose structure of thing, an umbrella that it needs to kinda land in.
Mason:Mhmm. And how how much autonomy do you give them? Obviously, you've got these guardrails, but, like, do you come in for shift on a Tuesday and all the team are, like, trying different cocktails, or is it just is it sporadic? Is it certain team members and not others? Like, where where does that come from?
Mason:Because it's a really cool concept, like, just getting more people. It's like free innovation for you. Right? I think you hear the term free innovation a lot in tech, but innovation is it can mean anything. Like you said, new cocktails and new concepts.
Mason:Yeah. It's like it it's really cool, and it's, like, quite a new concept to me, like, letting the team just go and create new cocktails under this umbrella.
Tom:Yeah. I think it's trust. I think a bit trust in that experience that they've got. It definitely happens more on the drink side. We we have a really great development chef who works part time on development stuff for us in the on the kitchen side as well.
Tom:And, again, that's a that is about realizing kinda more of Rachel's ideas and wants and having someone be able to kinda pull that together for her. Not that Rachel can't do that herself. She can, but that's not where our our time isn't focused in the kitchen. Our time isn't focused on the bar. It's focused on running a business.
Tom:But, we we will then give them quite a lot of free rein to run with it and bring their own ideas to it and test things as well. We don't it it's not it can't be too prescriptive. It's got to remain open, and we want them to feel some ownership of that stuff too.
Mason:I think that probably comes back to, like, the value piece that you didn't have when you were first in hospitality. Right?
Tom:Yeah. Yeah. For sure.
Mason:What's the weirdest cocktail concoction that's that's been brought to your attention?
Tom:Oh, okay. I've got I was like, I'm gonna think about this, but no. It's it's 100% the Parmtini. So we have a Parmesan infused vodka martini. So it's very What does
Mason:that just being honest, like, what does that actually
Tom:taste like?
Mason:To me, it doesn't sound that appealing.
Tom:Well, we'll get we'll try one. But I I do think I don't I will try one every four to six weeks because I I'm intrigued by it. I think it's an amazing drink, but it's not my kind of drink. It's it's a bit Marmite. Right.
Tom:Doesn't taste the Marmite. But what it does, it has almost like, a kinda saline saltiness to it from the cheese, and almost like vegetal, but, like, light I'm talking, like, light flavors in aromas here. If we get that batch wrong, if it's too much cheese in there, it just it's a bit like smelly feet. But it's and we we did some test batches, and it really was like Smelly Feet. But, that is not to put anyone off having a Parmtini Ace pizza.
Tom:It's a really cool drink, but it's subtle. It's a subtle flavor, and it's adding basically, adding a bit of savory into that while also, again, like, linking to a kind of providence of a product that we that is, you know, all over our pizzas, for example. Mhmm. So that's that's that's really been really successful. People love it, but you either know if you want it or not.
Mason:Yeah. Exactly. So I
Tom:don't think you'd going to that one.
Mason:When you're in a smelly feet mood all night.
Tom:See you. So that's a that's a weird successful drink that we've done. It wasn't certainly not not a disaster. It's a fixture on our menu and has been since we opened.
Mason:And have you launched any that you thought this is insane, this is gonna fly off, and then it's flopped and, like, what the what the learnings from that?
Tom:I I love a whiskey cocktail, and I I was adamant I've been adamant that we need one on the menu, but it's always the lowest selling. And I don't you know, how much
Mason:What do you think?
Tom:I don't know if it's if it's trends or what. I don't know how how much I can delve into that. We've had a perfect Manhattan. We've had we have one at the moment called the Capiche, which relates back to a business that Rachel used to run Italian American subs, and that's Samoretto and East London liquor blended whiskey. It's simple.
Tom:It's a really nice evening drink. We don't sell those, but there's value to it being on the menu. In another day, we might go, well, those product sales mean get rid of it. But, actually, it's it's about bringing some balance to the menu as well. So that's there for a different reason than the hundreds of mugs we sell every week.
Tom:So may I don't know I don't think yet we've had any huge disasters on the drink side, and and I think they wouldn't have got they wouldn't have got to the menu. So food wise, even I think because it's such a well oiled machine and Rachel's been developing that pizza and working on that pizza for for years, it's the system in place to get a great pizza out of it is is pretty pretty robust. I think the interesting thing for us and what we do at a restaurant is it's a much more expanded menu. So you have snacks, what we call not pizza. We do crispy fried artichokes, which are like a real people pleaser.
Tom:And then they they have been a real success story. They're like a fried snack that's gluten free, vegan. It's the things we that's who we if someone's parents are in, we send them out an artichokes as a little, here, have this on us kind of thing. But the actual most difficult thing, I think, in the kitchen has been adding those other elements to what is normally a very refined kitchen. Pizza kitchens are usually eight pizzas, some olives, and a garlic bread, and it's it's it's very boundary and limited in terms of not limited.
Tom:That's the wrong word maybe, but it's a there's a reason people more and more people are getting into pizza kitchens. It's a really good business model. It's good gross profit. You can control your wastage really well. It's a profitable model, and what we've chosen to do is is elevate that experience and add more variety to it with the rest of the menu.
Tom:And that's probably getting that balance over the last six to nine months has been the hardest part more than the recipes themselves. Like, is that dish wrong? Is it causing pain throughout a busy service? Take it off. I think that's that's been that's been the Tetris, the menu Tetris.
Tom:Mhmm.
Mason:And then going on to food, I guess, because you guys have got, like, two sizes of pizza or you've got one pizza that you do that's ginormous. Yeah. You're talking about the kitchen Tetris of the complexities of food wastage and and things like Why is it why is it specific that you just do that one pizza in that size?
Tom:Yeah. We when we we went to New York in February prior to prior to the restaurant build, we'd both been before, and Rachel definitely gone there in research purposes before. But we literally went on an r and d trip to New York, which the accountants loved, but we got it through. It genuinely was in kind of stretchy pants. Like, I've never eaten so many pizzas or slices of pizza in my whole life.
Mason:Well, it was all for work.
Tom:Yeah. It was all for work. But we really did it. We really got around, and we weren't just looking at food. We were looking at service.
Tom:We were looking at desserts. We were looking at decor. It was really it really informed in in a lot of ways. We went to a great pizzeria who did a larger a larger pizza that they called the n y slice even though it was a full full pie, but they they only had the specific topping for that pizza. It just seemed really interesting.
Tom:And we were a four, and we got it. We got, like, two pizzas and that pizza. And it it felt it just felt different. We're like, that's cool. And I think in a way and we kinda brought a bit of that back is our large we do a 20 inch vodka mark, basically, and we we just bake it a little bit differently.
Tom:And they didn't so that we might we might bake it a little bit low, a little bit longer.
Mason:What does that what does that do to the crust then?
Tom:I suppose you go more towards a New York style, but we actually we don't overdo that. So it doesn't end up as this kind of flat crisp, but it it it's a it's a bigger piece of dough stretched a bit differently, and it just bakes a bit differently. So it's it's kinda got it's got a little bit different going on about it. We wouldn't normally people are like, oh, so you can get 20 inch of every pizza. And it's like, the amount of dough balls we have to calculate and play that kind of fridge Tetris with week on week, weekend on weekend, we have to curtail the amount of those large dough balls we do.
Tom:But that's something that's really, really grown. It took a while for people to get into it, but there's there's that that's one of the best bits of theater in the restaurant is you take that. I mean, it's giant. It really is. It it's the it's the width of the table.
Tom:And you you bring that out and people look, and they say, I'm getting that next time. And actually, I think people quite naturally get what we're trying to do with it. That that's a different offer. That's to be shared. That's fun.
Tom:If you're a two and you don't wanna handle it, lots of twos do, then come back as a four and try it. It's yeah. I think I think we got the balance just about right with that. You get the odd person who might be like, well, why can't I put this on it? And if, you know, if it's quiet, we'll do it.
Tom:But the reality is a lot of those pizzas are built to they're an expression of something we think is really tasty, and we want you to trust why we designed it that way.
Mason:Trust us. We know what we're doing.
Tom:Yeah. Yeah. People come and then you get some really interesting mods and stuff where people go that on that on that, you know, I never thought of that. That sounds like a tasty pizza. I'm gonna try that myself.
Tom:But but, generally, like, trust, you know, we trust the time and development that's gone into those things. We think that's a complete package. Do what you want to it. That's fine, but but trust us on this one. And, yeah, the the large the 20 inches is really, really it's a really good one.
Tom:It's a great takeaway pizza as well. We're actually one piece of branding that we're waiting on. It's in it's on underprint is we've got these lovely 12 inch pizza boxes with Ace plastered on them. I'm not sure, apparently, council is gonna love us in the summer when they're all over the park, in plastic bags, but we've got yellow versions in our brand color as well coming for the 20 inch. So, again, owning that, like, brand piece of it as well, but there's something really impressive about that 20 inch, and I don't think it's going anywhere.
Mason:Yeah. Definitely. Definitely. What does this what does this summer look like for you? Obviously, like, being in Victoria Park, weather's nice, nice bit of area outside for people to do takeaways, or you talked about the jugs of of of spicy margs.
Mason:Like, what what's the thinking of, I guess, guerrilla marketing that's going into Ace Pizza on how to, like, really make the most of this this next summer period?
Tom:I'd like to think that we're thinking about guerrilla marketing. Mhmm. But but at the moment, it's almost we know what's I think we already know what's coming, and it's like, actually, what's the capacity to to handle that? There was a really there's this the Wednesday in Easter that was, like, 25 degrees, and people flocked down. We had a full restaurant, but we had a queue out the door.
Tom:It was like people were just moving along towards the park, and they all want a takeaway, and it just got we just really understood the capacity of the venue, the difficulty of running two quite similar well, I'm sorry, similar product across two models. How do we serve those guys but but still focus on a great dine in experience? And it was it was actually really good that it happened in April and not in July. Because it's it's like we we use that shift now as a that's building our, like, service model for the next few months. Also
Mason:And you've got a bit of crap weather between then and now anyway to figure it out before Yeah.
Tom:I think so. Yes. We've got time on it, but we and we've also got more seating this year as well. We kinda caught the back end of summer. So June and July are new are still completely new months for us.
Tom:We haven't done a full calendar year, so it's all new. And I think to get even to get to August and go, okay. We understand the the peaks and troughs of this business and and the flow. We know when we can take time to plan. We know when we need to double down on staff.
Tom:We're still we're still building that. But, yeah, I think brand awareness, we got a great marketing exec cat who we took a bit of a chicken and egg situation at the start of the year. We would we'd been spending on PR at the start. We had had freelancers in doing social media. We'd worked with agencies in the past, part timers, but you actually end up doing quite a lot of handholding with that stuff because you're trying to deliver your brand to someone else and make them understand it in the same way that you do.
Tom:And we decided whether it was financially well, it was a financial decision as well. Like, can we afford a salary for someone to come in when we we don't know what impact that's gonna have? And actually so we took a bit of a leap a leap of faith with that, but it's been really positive. And we've been do we basically have our own in house marketing, and that's been really fruitful for us. And it's allowed us to do a few more bespoke things, a few more events.
Tom:It's allowed us to make the most of all of our really great branding and the people we work with in design and and other things. So actually, in terms of Gorilla, I think just normal marketing, we're out there and we're visible in that space. You walk out of the park and you see our pink yellow restaurant, and it's it's great. All of those kind of creative risks that we took and working with great people really paid off. And I like to think that people want people want pizza.
Tom:Right? That's that's that's that's out
Mason:there. That's not news. Whether it's like people want pizza.
Tom:I think people want Ace pizza. I think I'd say that to Rachel a lot. People you get pizza everywhere, but I think people want Ace Pizza, and that's great. That's it's been so well received. And, actually, the building blocks we put together really work well for us, and we're very lucky with the location.
Tom:There isn't really anything within the vicinity. We took upon on a building that needed a lot of work, but it's paid off. And, like, Victoria Park sorry. Victoria Park is booming. And we know we brought some of that energy, but so have loads of other people, and it and it's kinda symbiotic with the businesses around us.
Tom:It's very local around there. It's very independent. Everyone backs each other. Everyone looks out for each other.
Mason:And nod to each other in the street.
Tom:Yeah. But we're gonna we it's some of the next three months are gonna be crazy, and it's just about being ready for it. But I think we're ready for it.
Mason:Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. Definitely.
Tom:It's gonna happen, whatever. There's only one way through, and that's, like, you know, going through it.
Mason:Yeah. And you said people want ace pizza. Like, why do you think they want ace pizza?
Tom:I think the product is great. I can say that without too much bias because I've been enjoying Ace Pizza since Rachel launched it in the pub, and that was Priya's getting together as well. I remember being in that pub and going, like, no knowing her. I knew her, friends and stuff. But with with mutual friends being like, this is this is great.
Tom:Like, it's onto something here. You know, pizza is booming and lots of people are doing interesting things, but I don't think Rachel gets the credit enough credit for what she's brought to the scene that everyone talks about now, really. So the product should look after itself. I think what we've been able to do in the restaurant is give a unique expression of what we both like, whether that's music, decor, attitudes, lots of different things. I don't I think if you come down to the restaurant, you see that it's not really like anywhere else.
Tom:That's that's its best statement is that it's not derivative of a New York slice shop or there's nothing wrong with that. Like, people go and have those experiences, and they come back and wanna replicate them. I think our stuff is a bit is a bit more of a mix a mix of experience. I think what that brings is something quite unique. I think we're quite unique in what we do and what we what we show, and people are people receive it really well.
Tom:You do get those comments sometimes where they just go, are you are you involved with the are you one of the owners? You go, you go. Literally, someone said to me, I really I get what you've tried to do here. I really get it. It's great.
Tom:That those ones that when when people see the rounded experience and what it every aspect that it's taken to get it to that point. So maybe yeah. I don't know. I think the brand is strong. The identity, the the visuals, the color.
Tom:I think it's yeah. Also, it's I say it again, but it's there's something about it not being kinda super bro bro culture either. I think the the barbecue scene was so, beards and tats, and there's something quite I wouldn't say we're super feminine, but it's there's something new there's something neutral about us. It's more about an attitude. It's not gendered and
Mason:Everyone likes a spicy mug as
Tom:Yeah. And I think it invites it invites a lot of people in, whether that's what we champion in terms of the products we serve, like providence of ingredients, working with locals. Like, we don't do a full stamp and say, like, we only work with businesses within two miles. We can't do that because we need a lot of Italian products. So but, you know, five points.
Tom:They're they're our beer on tap. They're a mile they're less than a mile down the road. I can I could drive and pick up a keg if we got short? It's great to have those relationships and kind of build that together. So, yeah, I think a lot I don't know.
Tom:I don't know what the one one reason is, but it takes a village. Right? And I think that's that's a big piece of it. And, hopefully, yeah, restaurant wise service, staff, team, If we can if we can engage the the team and we can, like, them and give them that autonomy and they they feel ownership of what we're doing, and the minute you come through that door, you should you should have an amazing dining experience. It's not always gonna happen, it's like that's that's life, but that's the that's the goal is that you feel special when you come in there and it's and it is just pizza.
Tom:But, you know, it should why shouldn't you feel special?
Mason:You're oversimplifying it now. Yeah. I didn't even ask you about music. Like, who's who's who's resident DJ? Like, have you got a playlist that you play?
Mason:Or is it you? Is it Rach? Is it the team? Like It's bit of both. Is there experimentation there?
Tom:Do you know what? There's there's always there was a to do list, and at the bottom of it, it always said playlist, playlist, playlist in capital letters because if I could do anything, I would sit at home and just put good songs onto the playlist. But it's the last thing you get to do in the day to day manager of the business. So we we we had yeah. I think, really well, not really.
Tom:My my dad used to own a record shop, and so a lot of my music is informed by him. He got really excited when I said, here's a bit of a brief because we're going we're kind of into eighties into nineties. There's, like, there's some vibe there with eighties British Italian party was kind of one of the conceptual sentences we started with with the architect. And I wanted this kind of eighties synth night, like, kind of post punk mix with some bits of cheese in there, bit of Tina Turner, bit of go west, easing into, like, early nineties and bit of rave culture, etcetera. Like, this amalgamation of, I don't know, like, tongue in cheek pop, I suppose, but but good.
Mason:Yeah. Yeah.
Tom:Yeah. And that set about this first playlist, but that playlist just wasn't long enough. It wasn't we couldn't just keep playing it on shuffle. So then we did put we did put more considered time, and Rach got heavily involved. And we we have lots of different players for different different times of the day, like, chill stuff, more upbeat, it's a little disco.
Tom:Like, we we kind of there's something for every every part of service, I suppose, and the staff then the staff then have control over what goes on and when. We try and I encourage them as much as possible to share what they think might work on there. But again, busy service. They wanna go home and make playlists for their mates, not for me. But Yeah.
Tom:Yeah. I think music's really important to both of us, and it's a big part of our lives. And actually, I don't know if you knew that there was a Spotify outage yesterday. I don't know if you read about this. Suppose they launched, like, their twenty twenty year look back on twenty years of Spotify, and it does their yeah.
Tom:They did their annuals. And I think it crashed it. But I was I was at I was in the kitchen yesterday, and the music stopped. Was really apparent. I said to the team, what's going on?
Tom:We're like, don't know. We can't connect it. And Spotify had gone down, so no one's Spotify in that area was working at that point. And we put we put it all through, like, Sonos link speakers, and Mhmm. We had to play one of their radios with ads.
Tom:It was really, really but what was so interesting was it was we couldn't do anything but do that. And so, like, the Sonos is you know, that kind of ad came on, and I'm like, this is really horrible. I wonder what the customers think. And we
Mason:Did you go out and tell the customers and, like, just pay or just, like,
Tom:you just tried to smooth it out? But, weirdly, the I don't know how much the music knew of our algorithm, but it put some pretty good stuff on there. But it also put, like, really on the nose popular stuff like Toto Africa and Guns N' Roses, and it felt really out of place, and it made me realize how actually, well well, I have considered it is what we have put in place in terms of the music, and it's a really important part of the piece. And I wish I had more time every day to put songs on that playlist. But, yeah, a mix.
Tom:Me and Rach, some staff bits, and, yeah, my my dad continues to send me playlists with things he might think thinks would work well on it, is always nice to have a bit of different input.
Mason:Yeah. Definitely. Definitely. So we talked about, I guess, the business journey, the highs, the lows, everything in between, all the experimentation. Like, what does what does the next twelve months, the life race piece, what is it like for you guys?
Tom:Get through this first year, I think, like, seeing that that full model, like, what what does that restaurant operate like and when is a really important picture for us. We set out to to not not have a single site restaurant. We don't wanna be twelve, fifteen, 25 portfolio. I think we knew quite quickly the business model we forecast on would work better with two to three sites and the and using the existing infrastructure that we think is strong. So to make it kinda viable for all parties, I think that's what we've gotta do.
Tom:So this space has been so much busier than we ex even expected. We knew it was good. We knew it was gonna be good, but it's exceeded expectations, and that's great. It's a really good problem to have. But it's it's it's taken us away from some more of that growth stuff, And I think we both need time on growth.
Tom:We need a steady team, a steady ship, and we can look ahead. But I think this year, it's about getting through and 100% understanding that business and being and reflecting back on the success of it as well. That's that's something we've not had a lot of time to do. But, yeah, plans for plans would be for 2027, I think. Not you know, without without any for anything firm, but, you know, we it's not to say we're not looking.
Tom:It's not to say we're not keeping an eye out for the right space. But, yeah, three to five years, we'd you know, I'd love to have three three Ace pizzas in probably similar areas. Not necessarily all Hackney, but we built a neighborhood pizzeria. That's very much part of the concept. And there's something about that replicating that footfall with that kind of local energy with a destination element that's just seemed to work really, really well for us.
Tom:So so somewhere in Soho would be amazing, but it would be such a different space. I think we've landed on on something that's kind of really complementary at the moment. So so, yeah, growth, work life balance for us, yeah, is a key Less janitering. To. Yeah.
Tom:It's, you know, practicing what we preach, I suppose, on that side. But, yeah, it's it's understandable. It takes it takes a lot of work, but we we need to find our a better pattern and a kind of more rewarding pattern for us so that we that we, yeah, that we stay refreshed and we stay positive throughout this process and drive forward with a really great team.
Mason:Good. Thank you for that. Just to close off the episode, we ask every guest that comes on what they're most grateful for. It can be anything everything anything between a person, a thing that you've learned throughout the process.
Tom:It's gotta be Rach. It has to be. I mean, we wouldn't be here if I wouldn't be here talking if Rach hadn't had that confidence and trust in me, that confidence and trust in the relationship as well to stand up to that. We've so so many times fall on the same page, and I think that's that's what that's what's made it such a success. But, you know, it's it's difficult.
Tom:It's difficult doing that with your partner. So I can't be the easiest person to deal with all the time. So I haven't How
Mason:about you, Jim?
Tom:So I'm I mean, I'm grateful for I'm grateful for Rachel's trust and and commitment to me and to the project because we couldn't do it without each other.
Mason:Amazing. Thank you so much for coming on and telling the story. It's it's exciting to see what's gonna happen in the next twelve months.
Tom:Yeah. Bring it on.
Mason:Good. Cool.
Tom:Thanks, Grateful. Cheers.