Fancy some potato and rosemary sourdough bread? How about a sultana and fennel loaf? Ran Avidan did, but the 35-year-old, who came to London from Israel to work as a management consultant, couldn’t find his favourite breads anywhere.
“In Israel there are lots of shops selling an exhaustive selection of delicious freshly baked bread every day,” Ran says. “There are very few shops selling really good handmade loaves in London.”
But instead of shrugging his shoulders and buying a sliced white loaf, Ran, along with his colleague, Tom Molnar, decided to bake his own bread. “In 2003 we handed in our notice at the management consultancy where we were working and started looking for backers and a site,” he says.
But even the best-laid plans can go awry. Ran and Tom met Gail Mejia, a well-known figure in the baking industry. She owns the Bread Factory,which supplies bread to some of the best restaurants in London, as well as to Baker & Spice, the delicatessen, which has three outlets in West London.
“Gail was having difficulties with the management in the Bread Factory and asked us to take over and help to turn round its fortunes,” Ran says. “It was not our intention to go into business with Gail when we set out, but it turned out to be a wonderful opportunity.”
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The duo put their management consultancy skills to good use. The Bread Factory’s turnover doubled to more than £3.5 million within two years and they built a state-of-the-art bakery at a cost of
£1.5 million. They also won the title of the London Chamber of Commerce’s Turnaround Business of the Year.
Once the Bread Factory was on a firmer footing, Ran and Tom again turned their attention to creating their own brand of handmade bread to sell on the high street. “Our experience at the Bread Factory, which we still manage, means that we now know the industry inside out,” Ran says.
“We started looking for sites and thinking about a name for a bread shop. We decided on West Hampstead pretty quickly, but deciding on the name was a more arduous process.”
Ran admits that choosing the name Gail’s was seen by some as a strange move, because although Gail was a backer of the new venture, it was Ran and Tom’s enterprise. “Even Gail thought it was odd, but it was the first name we thought of and, after weeks of brainstorming, it was still the best,” Ran says.
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Gail’s opened in June last year, selling bread, pastries and cakes. The bread is freshly baked in the Bread Factory’s main bakery and delivered each day, while the pastries are baked on site. The shop opened to a roaring trade, turning over £700,000 in its first year.
“Gradually we increased the range of bread and pastries and now sell about 25 different types of bread,” Ran says. The shop also sells other products, such as ham and salmon, and takes orders for small parties and large events. There is fun in the shop, too. Customers who sign up as “very important breadheads (VIBs)” are invited to tastings and parties on the premises.
The success of the first shop has prompted the pair to think about opening more outlets. Ran says: “We would like to open as many as we can, as long as all the bread is handmade and remains free of additives and preservatives. We don’t want to go beyond the point where we can do this. The aim is that Gail’s will be a recognisable brand, but we would like each shop to be a little different.”