VETERAN Glasgow restaurateur Alan Tomkins has highlighted the returning confidence in the city's hospitality scene after launching his first new venues in more than five years.
Mr Tomkins, who in a 30-plus-year career has run some of Glasgow's best-known restaurants, has opened two new premises in the past two months - his first since the recession began.
The operator, who owns Vroni's, Blue Dog and the Urban Bar and Brasserie in the city centre, launched a fine dining restaurant in the Western Club on Royal Exchange Square at the start of the month.
It opened the private members' club to the general public for the first time.
The 65-cover Western Club Restaurant represents an investment of £300,000, which included an interior refurbishment led by designer Amanda Rosa.
The launch coincided with his opening of Ollie's, a neighbourhood bistro in what was formerly Mise En Place in the south side of the city.
With a clutch of other new restaurants launching in the city in recent months, and more in the pipeline, Mr Tomkins said the industry is showing signs of moving on from the downturn.
Citing imminent moves by UK-wide restaurant chains such as Cote to the city centre, he said: "It has been quiet for a long time now. But from a city perspective it's starting to look good for Glasgow.
"Martin Wishart is opening at Malmaison and there are two or three openings in St Vincent Street, albeit by bigger players.
"Glasgow is attracting a lot of plcs to the heart of the city centre."
Mr Tomkins described the mood among city operators as cautiously optimistic, but said legacies from the downturn remained.
Noting that previous recessions through which he has traded did not seem so protracted, he said restaurant operators have had to adapt to remain in business.
One example has been the widening of the number of entry level - or house - wines on drinks lists, a response to slower sales of premium wines.
However, while Mr Tomkins said restaurateurs had been "become accustomed to being thrifty", the pursuit of value for money is not new to him.
"For 30 years I have always been committed to delivering value," he said. "I call it the 'morning after effect', where people wake up the next morning and wonder how much they spent on food and drink at your venue has been value for money."
And Mr Tomkins is certainly pleased with how the public have responded to the Western Club Restaurant in the short time it has been trading. "So far everybody who has come in has been absolutely wowed by the design of it," he said.
"It's a very calm place as well, I feel. I think it's going to work equally well for those who use it from a business perspective and those who use it for a social evening out. It's balanced quite well."
The operator has not set any targets for the restaurant yet, preferring to let word of mouth and in-outlet promotion in his other venues build its reputation.
He believes the club has taken a brave step in turning its restaurant into a commercial operation.
And while he concedes it will be perceived as a fine dining restaurant, he has sought to give the premises a "contemporary feel" by virtue of its decor and by eschewing white linen tablecloths.
Revealing it was the club that had approached him over the venture, he has no doubt about the potential the restaurant has presented to him.
Mr Tomkins said: "The bottom line was that I came in and had a look at this dining room, which didn't look anything like this then, and was completely taken with the whole potential for the space.
"The location is totally outstanding, [and] the views over Royal Exchange Square are iconic in a Glasgow sense. At night it is fairy-light city out there.
"It is just the most fantastic location, the most fantastic space and I just felt it was crying out to be an elegant restaurant. So it didn't take a lot of persuading for me to get into partnership with the Western Club."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article