Beckford Group to open three new sites in three months

The Beckford Group is to open three new properties in Wiltshire in early 2026, including its first hotel.

 

The 17-bedroom Teffont House hotel in the Nadder Valley will open in April 2026. The building, which dates to 1623, is being renovated and extended to include a 40-cover restaurant and bar, a croquet court, barbecue area and treatment cabin with a sauna and plunge pond.

 

Ahead of the hotel opening, the group will also launch Corsham House on Corsham High Street in February. The restaurant will offer 94 covers, a bottle shop and tasting room, and 14 bedrooms.

 

The group is including sustainable initiatives in the renovation of the listed property, including solar panels.

 

A month later in March, the group will launch the King’s Arms in Monkton Farleigh as its fifth pub. Some 40 to 50 local residents have financially supported the reopening of the pub through a two-year loan.

 

The 17th-century site, which has been shut for more than a year, will relaunch with six upstairs bedrooms and two further rooms outside of the pub. There will be 50 covers for drinks and dining inside and space for 30 in the courtyard garden.

 

The Beckford Group was founded in 2009 and is led by Dan Brod, Charlie Luxton and Matt Greenlees. It currently operates four pubs with rooms and two restaurants in the south-west of England.

 

Existing sites include the Beckford Arms, the Bath Arms, the Talbot Inn and the Lord Poulett Arms, which are dotted around rural Wiltshire and Somerset, as well as the Beckford Bottle Shop and the Beckford Canteen in the city of Bath.

 

The business also includes bath and body brand Bramley, which as well as creating products for the Beckford Group has expanded to supply restaurants and hotels across the UK, as well as having an online presence.

 

The group’s three new openings will create nearly 100 new jobs, as well as opportunities for existing staff.

 

“We love our staff and want to provide them room for growth through management opportunities,” Brod told The Caterer.

 

“While it’s been tricky with staffing costs over the past year, the Beckford Group is always going to be a people business and it’s something we’ve got to deal with.

 

“We’ve put our prices up a bit and they’ve held, which makes me optimistic about hospitality because it’s much more expensive to eat out anywhere – whether that’s Pret A Manger or Claridge’s – but people are still spending the money because they value the experience.”

 

F&B across the group will be overseen by Adam Bristow, former head chef at the Pig at Harlyn Bay. James Harris, current head chef at the Beckford Bottle Shop, will move to Corsham House, which Brod described as a “British brasserie with a heavy West Country accent”.

 

Corsham House will take inspiration from the group’s Bath restaurants – Beckford Bottle Shop, which has a Michelin Bib Gourmand, and Beckford Canteen which, like the Beckford’s other properties, focuses on local produce.

 

“The food is meant to be simple, tasty and approachable – no foams,” added Brod. “While there will inevitably be the odd gel, the food is trying to stay honest. It’s a special treat to go out, so it needs to be what you don’t eat at home.”

 

The group first looked at Teffont House as a hotel opportunity nearly three years ago, but the project was subject to multiple delays. Brod said he wants to “reimagine what the words boutique hotel mean, because it’s so overused”.

 

Brod will be hands-on with the opening alongside business partners Luxton, who looks after the creative and interiors, and Greenlees, who looks after operations, having joined the business from Babington House in 2013.

 

“We didn’t plan to do three – you’ve got to be nuts,” added Brod. “You’ve got to do twice as much for the same profit [these days]. The incentive was to do more sites, because every site will be less profitable.

 

“But we started out in pubs with rooms, and an ‘inn’ is the original hotel. We’ve learned what it means to look after a guest, so we’ll be OK.”