Making waves in Belfast

It’s now three months since local duo, Patrick Gray and Paul De Francisci brought a taste of Hawaii’s exotic North Shore to Northern Ireland with the opening of the first Northern Irish branch of their distinctive Kua ‘Aina restaurant chain.

Inspired by Terry Thompson’s iconic Hawaiian burger and sandwich grill that bears the same name, Belfast’s Kua ‘Aina restaurant – located in Victoria Square shopping centre – is the third outlet to open in the UK. The other two are located in the heart of London.

“Our Belfast restaurant symbolises two Northern Irish boys bringing their business home,” Paul De Francisci said recently.

And speaking to LCN this month, Patrick Gray said:

“Belfast is my home town and ever since I was a kid, I’ve just wanted to have a business here. We have the local knowledge, which is invaluable to a small business like ours, and we like to go where there is a big presence in our demographic,” he added. “We felt that Belfast was under-populated in terms of our competition and the type of offering that we have.”

Kua ‘Aina is a licensed restaurant – it’s the only place in Ireland where you can buy Hawaiian Kona beer – and it offers a typically Hawaiian-inspired surf ‘n’ turf menu with a noticeable emphasis on quality local sourcing.

Patrick reports that since opening three months ago, business has been strong:

“Certainly, we’re very happy. December was way beyond expectation and while there was some slow-down in January, understandably, things are beginning to turn around again now and we feel very positive about how everything is going,” he said.

Patrick said that it had been important to him from the outset of the project to be able to offer new jobs to the public in Belfast and 30 new positions were created when Kua ‘Aina opened in December. He was also full of praise for Victoria Square centre manager, Michelle Greeves, and her senior management team:

“They have been very helpful to us and that really helped to get this deal across the line,” he added. “We like to go to places where we know we are wanted and this was a match made in heaven to be honest, to be able to work with this type of committed people.”

The chain came originally to the UK when Paul De Francisci and the third partner, Ed Bardos, saw it in operation in Japan, where there are now 53 outlets. They liked it so much that they bought the franchise for the UK and Europe and brought the brand to London.

Patrick came into the business about 18 months ago. He has a background in hospitality, having run a Boston Tea Party outlet in Bristol and worked with burgeoning GB restaurant chain, Bill’s. He is now operations director with Kua ‘Aina and he admits that he’s “clocking up the air miles” at present as he spends three days a week in Belfast and the rest of his time at the London restaurants. Although, as Belfast becomes more established, the founders will spend less time in the city.

“We’ve appointed Harry Abley as operations manager here in Belfast and I think it’s important that he feels that this is his restaurant,” explained Patrick. “My being here all the time doesn’t really help him to achieve that.”

As for feedback, Patrick says that reaction on the floor in Kua ‘Aina has been “incredible”, but he admits that on social media, “it’s been a little more hit and miss than we’re used to”. He’s not overly concerned at this stage, however:

“This is about people discovering the brand and some of them will decide they don’t like it,” he remarked. “That’s OK. The most exciting feedback that we have had is around the fact that here, you can have your burger cooked exactly the way you want it and also around the quality of service. Many city centre restaurants have a relatively robotic service that’s not very exciting. But we get lots of comment about service here and that’s what we want. As a result, we’re looking at menu tweaks and service offering changes specifically for the Belfast store.”

As for the immediate future, the priority is consolidation:

“This is a small business and when we do expand, I want to be sure that we have as good a team then as we do now,” said Patrick.

The partners are working on opening a fourth outlet, which will be somewhere in London. It will open in June or July. And a fifth branch, also in London, should be open by September or October inside what Patrick cryptically describes as “the most famous shop in the world”.

“Our ultimate ambition in Belfast is to keep the restaurant here for the long term and be able to look at expanding in Ireland,” added Patrick. “We would look at another store here in the north before we would go down south.”

Our main picture show Patrick Gray (right) with operations manager, Harry Abley.