Scarborough Brewers Fayre to be Converted

Whitbread has revealed plans to shut down its remaining Beefeater and Brewers Fayre restaurants, converting them to hotel rooms and integrated hotel restaurants.

Whitbread PLC, the parent company of Premier Inn, has unveiled a new five-year strategic plan that aims to transition the company into a “pure-play hotel business” by 2031. The move involves a significant overhaul of the company’s "branded restaurant" estate, a category that includes sites such as Scarborough's Carousel Brewers Fayre.

The organisation intends to replace its remaining 197 branded restaurants with a more efficient, integrated food and beverage model that is already operational at 500 of its other sites. The firm says the decision follows a "rigorous business review" which revealed that while the hotel division is performing well, the branded restaurant portfolio has struggled financially. According to company data, these 197 sites generated a site-level adjusted loss before tax of £13 million in the 2026 financial year.

In a statement Whitbread said:

“Whitbread has announced that, as part of its proposed new Five-Year Plan, it intends to become a pure-play hotel business focused on Premier Inn, the UK’s number one hotel brand, which is synonymous with quality and value. 

“This change will involve exiting all of our remaining branded restaurants, which trade under brands including Beefeater and Brewers Fayre, a number of which will be converted into approximately 600 additional Premier Inn rooms, with the remainder expected to be sold as going concerns.

“The proposed changes announced today build on the success of our Accelerating Growth Plan, announced in 2024, which involved the conversion of over 200 branded restaurants to additional rooms, and the creation of an integrated restaurant in each hotel. This format has proved highly popular with guests and under the proposal, it would be rolled out to all hotels where there is currently a branded restaurant.

“We recognise the impact of this proposal on colleagues who work at the affected sites. As a business which recruits around 15,000 people every year, we expect to be able to retain a significant proportion of those affected and will be looking to redeploy as many of our impacted colleagues as possible. However, we do anticipate that the proposed changes, which are subject to consultation, would result in a reduction of around 3,800 roles of a total UK and Ireland workforce of around 30,000. We will do all we can to support those colleagues affected.”

Human Impact and Workforce Changes The transition is expected to have a significant impact on the company's personnel. Whitbread has confirmed that the plan is anticipated to result in a reduction of approximately 3,800 roles across its UK and Ireland workforce.

The company has stressed that these changes remain subject to a required employee consultation process. In an effort to humanise the transition, Whitbread stated it will seek to find alternative opportunities for staff where possible, either through new roles created by the expansion or through its existing recruitment programme, which handles around 15,000 hires annually. The organisation noted that it expects to retain a “significant proportion” of those affected by the closures.

Strategic Rationale for the Overhaul Dominic Paul, the Chief Executive of Whitbread, asserted that the new plan is designed to “maximise value creation over the medium and long-term” by making the company’s assets “work harder”. He stated:

“Our conclusion is that our model is the right one... But we can improve our approach. We will refocus our capital spend and recycle more of our freehold real estate, driving increased margins and returns”.

By converting underperforming restaurant spaces, Whitbread plans to unlock room for 3,000 "higher returning extension rooms" at Premier Inn locations where demand currently outstrips supply. The company is confident that this integrated dining format is preferred by hotel guests and will deliver better margins than the traditional branded restaurant format.

Future Outlook Over the next 24 months, the company intends to sell 110 of its branded restaurants as going concerns while converting the remainder into the integrated hotel-dining model. By 2031, Whitbread expects this specific restaurant transition to generate an incremental profit contribution of £100 million.

The company aims to complete the removal of its remaining branded restaurants during the second half of the 2027 financial year, prioritising capital allocation toward the expansion of the Premier Inn brand.

It's understood the Carousel Brewers Fayre in Scarborough will remain open until at least September.