Chestnut Bakery.
Belgravia, London.
Chestnut Bakery opened in the UK with strong anticipation. In the golden age of bread making, Chestnut’s bakers craft the perfect antidote to the supermarket loaf. Championing and nurturing the world’s most essential foodstuff, embracing worldwide baking traditions and championing a culture of innovation to bring people together.
Auden Founder, Scot Turner worked alongside Chef Ahmed Al Bader to develop the brand from a dark kitchen concept in Kuwait to be able to take its place in London as a brick-and-mortar site in some of the finest neighbourhoods. The work involved brand development, design, pre-opening and operating for the first three months of the Flagship Belgravia store.
The Project
Brand Development
Chestnut Bakery were operating as a delivery-only brand in Kuwait, part of the Group Six United family alongside brands Habra, Lunch Room and Gun Bun. As part of the partnership with SISBAN, Chestnut Bakery was identified as a brand that could be scaled globally following the success of other bakery brands such as Gail’s and Ole & Steen.
Taking the original logo, the team retained the essence but worked on a more prominent image and included the handwritten location by Chef Al Bader that could localise each Bakery. Alongside the logo, the team then worked on the overall brand look, feel and messaging and created a strong brand identity that could be relevant globally.
Once the brand guidelines were built the team started to work with LINES, a multidisciplinary design firm in Kuwait to create the design of the Bakeries with signature elements in each store such as a clay oven, the original bread oven, lamination room where guests could watch croissants being made by the bakers and the iconic coffee counter working with Slayer Espresso to have a strong identity to the drinks program.
Pre-Opening
During the construction phase, the team worked on the build BOQ tender and project management collaborating with the design team and contractors to ensure the project look and feel was delivered as the original design envisioned overcoming the challenges of building a bakery during the covid-19 pandemic.
The team also worked on the detailed kitchen design to ensure that the initial location Belgravia could not only function as a standalone store but also as a production unit for wholesale customers and future Bakeries under the Chestnut Bakery brand. This included a detailed review of the production workflow and selecting equipment that could increase efficiency, and automate processes where possible.
Operations Management
During the construction, the team then worked on bringing the brand to life through the products that would be served to the customer. Menu development took place over a three-month period with weekly tasting sessions to ensure the product look and taste delivered the essence of the brand and developed the now iconic lemon meringue croissant, reviewing recipes and creating training material for the teams. In total the team worked on around 150 SKUs for the opening of the first Bakery in Belgravia across loaves of bread, lamination, flatbreads, desserts and breakfast menus.
Once the construction period was finished the team then embarked on the pre-opening training and marketing activity with an opening campaign called “Breaking Bread Since…” which chronicled the birth of famous breads and viennoiserie shown in a timeline up to the opening of the first Chestnut location. The campaign saw adverts in the London underground and Bus Stations and worked with key food-led influencers such as Clerkenwell Boy and Edd Kimber that achieved over 20,000 Instagram followers prior to opening.
Chestnut Belgravia, the brand's flagship location opened in May 2021 and has subsequently opened a second location in Covent Garden. The first global outpost is planned in Q4 2022 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
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