Why Finding UK Floorspace For Sausage Restaurants Might Be Hard

Bratwurst is coming to a high street near you, maybe.

Long familiar on the streets of New York and Berlin, the pork sausage served in a white bread roll will fight for space in a crowded and sometimes hostile UK fast food scene.

Extrawurst, established in 1981 with 20 outlets in the west of Germany listed on its website, plans to extend a franchise into the UK in 2022.

Sutton Coldfield-based Burley Browne is advising on the expansion. Stores in Birmingham and Nottingham have already been secured, and two more are being sought, Business Insider reported.

Extrawurst’s UK franchisee will operate from retail parks, high streets, stations and shopping centres.

The offer will include bratwurst along with burger-like frikadelle, schnitzel and frankfurter.

The promoters are reported to be looking for up to 100 sites over the next three years, Big Hospitality reported.

This could be a tough target to meet. In a land dominated by the Greggs meat slice and the indigenous chippie tea, imported grab-and-go concepts often struggle. Ambitious plans for rapid nationwide expansion are rarely fulfilled.

The list of disappointments includes Chick-fil-A, which experimented with a single unit before closing eight weeks later, whilst Wendy’s burgers have made several efforts to break into the UK, the latest launching in 2019 with a target of 20 stores. Today it has one, although Wendy's has its eyes on Stratford E14, Oxford and Croydon and plans a number of dark kitchens to meet takeaway demand.

Even relatively successful transplants take years to grow. Burrito brand Chipotle launched in 2010. Slow expansion in London was paused between 2015 and 2019, and 11 years later there are 12 UK outlets.