DUBLIN-BASED Jo’Burger restaurant group yesterday announced plans to open three to four new restaurants next year, creating 120 jobs.
Company director John Roberts confirmed the expansion after stating that revenues at the firm increased 230 per cent last year, with a similar increase projected this year. The firm runs five restaurants in Dublin – two Jo’Burger outlets, Crackbird and Skinflint, with Irish rugby international Jamie Heaslip having a share in the group’s Bear restaurant.
Mr Roberts said yesterday: “Jamie is very much involved. We meet up every week to discuss the business and he is chomping at the bit to be involved more.”
The last 18 months has seen rapid growth at the business, increasing from 15 employees in January 2011 to 115 today following the recent opening of a second Jo’Burger restaurant.
Mr Roberts said the business will record a profit this year, “although this will be diluted by costs of establishing Bear, housing Crackbird permanently and setting up Jo’Burger in town”.
Regarding recent filings to the Companies Office showing accumulated losses at Jo’Burger Ltd up 120 per cent from €76,229 to €168,439 in the 12 months to the end of December last, Mr Roberts said this was “down to investment costs in our brands” which were “once-off in nature. We also paid ourselves a little more than a pittance. We are still very much in investment mode.”
He said: “The business performed very well in 2011 with an increase of turnover of 230 per cent.”
The costs involved last year involved the funding of pop-up restaurants, which Mr Roberts said “were a phenomenal success”. Social media was fundamental to the restaurant group’s growth, he added.
Mr Roberts, who helped take the Jo’Burger business out of examinership in 2009, said the business had “fared very well since emerging from examinership”.
