Dishoom closing in on New York site

Dishoom is closing in on a site in New York ahead of plans to open its first overseas restaurant in the US.

 

Speaking at the Northern Restaurant & Bar show earlier this month, chief executive Brian Trollip said any restaurant would likely not open until 2026 if plans went ahead.

 

He said: “I was in New York last week looking at the site, and we’re very much hoping to get an offer in pretty soon. I don’t think we’ll be opening until the end of next year, if we were to get it, but we’re really keen to do that.

 

“We’ve been spending a lot of time…in January 2020 we were in Boston, Chicago, New York and [Washington] DC, looking at potential restaurant sites. All of us really, really love New York, and I think we sort of settled on that, so if we can get that off the ground, we’ll be really excited.”

 

Dishoom was reported to be working with advisers on plans for a US opening late last year.

 

It comes amid a period of expansion for the Indian restaurant group, which hired nearly 300 new staff members last year as its sales passed £100m for the first time.

 

It operates 10 Dishoom restaurants, including a 235-cover site in Battersea Power Station that launched in 2023, and Permit Room bars in Brighton, Cambridge and Oxford.

 

Trollip said: “We take absolutely nothing for granted. We’ve got a few restaurants now, but we’ve been around for 15 years and we don’t grow for growth sake. We only open another restaurant where we feel like we’ve got a story to tell that’s better than the last one.”

 

He added: “We are massively paranoid and obsessed and feel like unless we’re doing better every day, we’re probably doing worse. We just focus on that, day in, day out.”

 

The group has offered home delivery of dishes through Deliveroo since the pandemic, but Trollip said there were no plans for Dishoom to expand into the wider grocery market.

 

“I don’t think we’re looking to expand that brand or end up in supermarkets any time soon,” he said.