PROFILE: On the rise

They already own three London bars and have further heavyweight expansion plans. Clinton Cawood speaks to Sam Surl and Steve Kelly to find out the secrets behind the success of Rising Star Leisure 

If there was ever a lesson in playing to your strengths, it’s the partnership between Steve Kelly and Sam Surl, the pair behind Rising Star Leisure.
Surl is an industry veteran, having been involved in both the on-trade and drinks industries in a number of capacities. In comparison, Kelly is a newcomer to the industry. While Surl brings this experience and perspective to the group, Kelly contributes not only his business and entrepreneurial acumen, but also his perspective as a consumer, something he believes can get lost in the bar trade. As Surl explains, because Kelly is not from a trade background, he brings opinions that are “against the excesses of the trade”.
More specifically, Kelly says, “I don’t want the bars to be seen as places that take themselves too seriously – it’s about a balance between premium service and informality.”

Pubs with personality
This varies among the group’s three south London bars, which each have a distinct focus and personality. The first venue, Iniquity, opened its doors in 2004 in Battersea, with an emphasis on sophisticated cocktails. The next bar from the team was The People’s Republic, in Clapham, with a more contemporary cocktail list, and a system for customers to make suggestions for improvements. People’s Republic, in keeping with its location, “is a bit more edgy”, says Kelly.
The most recent opening, The Establishment, in Parson’s Green, was created to suit its local clientele, which is, as Kelly describes, “conservative with a small ‘c’”. The restaurant draws on what he calls the “Life on Mars zeitgeist” of recent times. The Establishment is also the group’s first food-led venue, meaning that wine, for example, is a greater focus here than for the other bars in the group.

Rising Star’s next restaurant, a Manhattan-style brasserie entitled Broome and Delancey, is set to open this month in Battersea.
From the beginning, the idea for the group was to “bring premium quality to a neighbourhood bar” says Kelly. This is something he acknowledges “is a cliché now, but four or five years ago it was’’t. People wanted to socialise on their doorstep, but were used to a particular level of quality”.
According to Surl, “Each site is different, but there are some commonalities.” One result of being neighbourhood venues is that, as Kelly explains, “you have to keep reinvesting, because of the repeat customers. We change the wine list regularly, and have evolved the actual venues itself”. Work was done on The People’s Republic only two and a half years after its opening, for example.
In addition to this investment into existing venues, Kelly has ambitious plans for expansion. “We’ve got two drinks-led locations, and now are six months into our first restaurant, which was turning a profit after three months,” he says, clearly intending on not only maintaining this momentum, but increasingly benefiting from experiences at the original locations.

Division of food and drink
The most practical result of this, as expansion continues, according to Kelly, will be the eventual division of the group’s food- and wet-led operations, with a branded proposition for each. “It would be nice to continue to roll out with one-offs, but having about 10 venues with three or four concepts seems more practical.”
This distinct strategy between wet- and food-led venues is important, according to Kelly. “It’s very difficult to straddle the line between bar and restaurant. You can’t have a three-course meal in a busy bar.”

If the pair had to choose between only running food- or drink-led venues, the decision would be an easy, and very practical one. “We’d definitely choose wet-led,” says Kelly. “There’s less complexity, and lower staff requirements, which means fewer issues.” Surl agrees, adding, “There’s also greater flexibility in terms of staff cost.” He acknowledges that food-led venues “are more complex, but therefore more interesting. There’s a pay-off”.
Despite Kelly’s awareness that more staff means the potential for more staff issues, it is Surl who deals with the majority of these – and not only as a result of his extensive experience in the trade. According to Kelly, “Sam’s got two kids, so he’s more patient.” Kelly sees himself more as the stereotypical impatient entrepreneur, in what almost seems like a subtle good-cop-bad-cop approach.

Seeing opportunities
In business terms, Kelly is indeed a typical entrepreneur, as the group’s rapid expansion and financial success attest to. He is well aware of the challenging economic climate he is operating in, but sees some very clear benefits to take advantage of.
“I see it as an opportunity. In good times, it is easier for mediocre operators,” says Kelly. Difficult times, for example, according to Kelly, can make it easier to acquire good sites, as these mediocre operators succumb to economic pressures. This is essential, as Kelly believes that the most important thing “is to choose the right locations”. This has clearly been a deciding factor for all of the venues in the group, and one that has undoubtedly contributed to their success. Iniquity is located on the busy Northcote Road, while People’s Republic faces Clapham Common, within sight of the underground station.

More generally, Kelly is philosophical about the current tough times facing the UK on-trade. “You can’t just enjoy the good times and then batten down the hatches in the bad,” he says. Rising Star’s clientele, in all of its locations, undoubtedly help when taking this approach, being unlikely to be hardest hit by a difficult economic climate. Kelly expands on this, saying: “We’re focusing on premium neighbourhoods, with good demographics, so we hopefully won’t be worst hit.”
Economic difficulty, as well as other potential challenges to the trade, such as the introduction of the smoking ban a year ago, are not as catastrophic as they may seem, believes Kelly. “Our habits as consumers become ingrained,” he says. “We’ve had inns for 2,000 years – it’s not as if a smoking ban was going to stop people going to bars.”

Discerning consumers
All of the venues that make up Rising Star Leisure are particularly distinct – all operating within different premium parts of the market. The differences are particularly clear in terms of each bar’s drinks offering. Surl explains that at The People’s Republic, there is a focus on “populist female spirits”, with a contemporary and classic cocktail list, as well as a number of international beers. Iniquity, on the other hand, has a “more eclectic cocktail list”. In addition to The Establishment’s focus on wine (the restaurant makes use of an enomatic system to facilitate the sale of wine by the glass), it also has a particular focus on gin and genever.
This has evolved in the few years since the creation of the Rising Star. Kelly has noticed that “people are more wine savvy, and are increasingly brand-calling spirits”. This is taking a different form to the brand calling common in the US market, one that Kelly spends a significant amount of time in. “In general, there they brand call without knowing about the drink, whereas here they have differences in taste – there’s a strong preference in terms of flavour.” The two both comment on what Surl describes as “the growth in discerning consumers”.

Rising Star’s bars and restaurants are well set to take advantage of this trend, given that the most defining and unifying feature of its venues is embodied in the name of its Clapham Common bar. For Kelly, the ways that the venues operate are informed by consumer demand, and not necessarily by trends within the industry. Both Surl and Kelly acknowledge that these trends within the bar trade do not always translate to consumer trends at all. For Surl, it is about “learning from our customers, but about challenging them as well”.
And it is undoubtedly about maintaining that focus on consumers as expansion continues.

db ©  June 2008