Leon has signed a major a new five-year agreement with Roadchef to help grow its presence across Britain’s motorways.
The agreement will pave the way for Leon to open in an additional 10 sites, resulting in a total of 12 restaurants across Roadchef’s 30-strong network.
The second phase of the roll out will start with the opening of two restaurants at Roadchef’s Northampton M1 Northbound and Rownhams M27 Southbound sites. The new agreement comes following strong demand at Leon’s first two motorway restaurants and shows people want to Eat Well when they are on the move.
Leon launched its partnership with Roadchef, the UK’s leading Motorway Service Area operator, in 2017 with restaurants at the Norton Canes M6 and Strensham M5 Southbound sites.
The Northampton and Rownhams sites will open this summer. Each site will create 30 jobs and will serve popular Leon dishes such as GFC - gluten-free chicken nuggets - alongside the bestselling and 100% plant-based LOVe Burger, the new Jack Wings, and classics like the Original Super Salad.
Having demonstrated the commercial viability of the brand in roadside locations, Leon is now set to trial similar formats in the US and Europe.
Co-founder and CEO John Vincent said: “It has long been my hope that we can help make food in service stations both nutritious and appealing. So I was excited to open our first two roadside restaurants with Roadchef.
'The response has been even more enthusiastic than I expected. People have been evangelical about what it means to them - many have told me they choose their routes just to eat there.
'I would like to thank everyone who works in these first two Leon motorway restaurants and all those in Roadchef and Leon who are now working to open many more. The response gives us confidence that we will be able to replicate the success in the US, where the drive-thru and drive-to culture is so strong.”
Mark Fox, CEO at Roadchef, said, “We are thrilled with the success of the two existing LEON restaurants and are incredibly excited to develop this relationship further with the opening of two new outlets this summer.
'In addition, we are also planning a pipeline of developments in the coming years, as we look to bring Leon’s brand of Naturally Fast Food to even more parts of the motorway network in our very own food revolution.”
The Rownhams Southbound site, located on the M27 between Junctions 3 and 4, will be the first Leon to launch in Southampton. The North Northampton Northbound site located on the M1 at Junction 15a, will also be the first Leon in Northampton.