Artisan for the masses

Damien Garvey (pictured) and his brother, Adrian, have high hopes for their burgeoning artisan coffee house chain, Synge and Byrne…

Entrepreneurial brothers Adrian and Damien Garvey have signalled their bold intentions for the burgeoning Synge & Byrne coffee shop business by re-branding one of their existing outlets- Olive at Sugar Quay in Newry – with the artisan chain’s distinctive colours.

The brothers, who have owned the rights to the O’Brien’s sandwich bar business in Northern Ireland for many years, launched the distinctive Synge & Byrne brand last December with an outlet at the Abbey Centre [featured]. A second 120-seater branch is set to open at the Foyleside in Londonderry this September and ultimately, the pair want to see the brand move into Scotland and perhaps, the north of England.

Newry-born Adrian and Damien Garvey have operated the O’Brien’s sandwich bar chain under licence in Northern Ireland since 2009, when the original brand went into liquidation. They currently have 13 outlets in the province with two more planned before the end of the year.

But Synge & Byrne is their very own creation. Modelled to slot into a gap in the market that the brothers believe exists just below the level of Costa, Starbucks and Avoca, it’s what Damien has called “artisan for the masses”.

The name itself came to him when he and his wife, Bernadette, were at home playing with their children – the youngsters were bouncing on their beds and Damien’s wife warned them that they shouldn’t get to close the some recessed spotlights in the ceiling because their hair might “singe and burn”:

“It just struck me as the perfect name for our new venture,” Damien told LCN recently. “A friend of mine who lives in Perugia [in Italy] has done all our branding work and I think he’s really grasped the idea of Northern Ireland looking out towards an external space but also, looking back in on itself. That’s really what we are trying to achieve here and we’ve been getting some fantastic feedback so far.”

Damien said that while December had been excellent for the Abbey Centre outlet, they’d expected business in January and February to fall back, perhaps by 30 or 40 per cent. In the event, trade was down by only around five per cent.

“There’s been some fluctuation since, but business is growing steadily,” he went on. “We’re getting a lot of custom based on recommendation…It’s a really good, artisan coffee shop and people are actually making this a destination of choice, which is brilliant. Trade is very steady and very positive, I’m pleased to say.”

Prior to 2009, when the UK arm of O’Brien’s Irish Sandwich Bars went into administration, Adrian and Damien had operated the franchise business in Northern Ireland.

They had become involved with that business initially through Adrian, who had been working for fresh produce supplier, Fyffes in the late 90s. He made the connection to O’Brien’s through a chef that he knew in Dublin and when the opportunity came to take the brand into the north, Adrian jumped at the chance. Damien, who was working for Fed Ex at the time, joined his brother at the helm of their thriving new business venture in 2006.

For a time, the brothers did well. The popular sandwich bars thrived on the back of the economic boom and at its peak, there were 23 outlets across the north. The company faltered across the UK and Ireland, however, as the downturn took hold and Adrian and Damien lost all but six of the branches when the company was liquidated five years ago. However, they were able to license the brand for use in the north and have been re-building the business in the years since.

Synge & Byrne is their attempt to develop their own, distinctive artisan coffee house brand and Damien says that so far, customers seem to be very happy with what they’ve seen:

“People are delighted,” he reported. “The biggest thing that they are saying to us is that it’s fantastic to get this sort of thing in a shopping centre like the Abbey Centre. The outlet in Newry is off the high street and the one in Derry is in a shopping centre, but it’s at the front so we’ll be opening outside the centre’s hours. It’s a really good mix and something we’ll be looking to export to Scotland and the north of England very soon.”

Adrian conceded that launching a new brand such as Synge & Byrne during a recession hadn’t been a decision that he and his brother had taken lightly:

“The thing is that a lot of people start with coffee shops because they like coffee,” he added. “But it’s 15 years since we began with O’Brien’s and we’ve seen lots of people come and go in that time. We know that it’s difficult to maintain your position in this industry after the five year mark – when there’s life in the market, then coffee shops are cool, trendy places to go, but Belfast is awash with them at present.

“We just felt that our reputation in the market and our relationships with landlords put us in a very strong position when it came to sites, and it’s all about the sites that you can secure. If you’re getting the sites, if you have the quality and if you’re getting it in front of enough people, then you’re going to do well but you need to remember that there’s a lot of competition out there.”

Going forward, Damien said that Synge & Byrne would be focused on making the most of its local food offering:

“It’s very easy to come up with a good business idea and then get lazy about it,” he added. “We’re very happy to have a platform that changes the seasons but maintains the quality throughout. Quality is probably the single most important aspect of the business, but we know that if the price is too high, then it won’t matter.”

And as for the future, Damien said he and his brother were aiming to open two new outlets each year:

“With Synge & Byrne, we’re looking outwards, we want to have a maximum of four or five outlets here and then go external, we want something with an international flavour, we want it all to be part of Northern Ireland doing well on the international stage. We want to be part of that and we want to take a bit of Northern Ireland outside the country for people to see,” he added.