Business Description
"Pret A Manger is a private company. After nearly 30 years, founders Julian Metcalfe and Sinclair Beecham are still significant shareholders. The majority stake of the company was acquired by European equity firm Bridgepoint in 2008.
Bridgepoint was chosen as a partner to Pret because the Bridgepoint team shares both the Pret vision and understands the Pret culture. It really is business as usual for the teams. Pret remains dedicated to selling freshly prepared, good, natural food.
Bridgepoint's investment is an opportunity to transform Pret A Manger from a domestic to an international business through controlled prudent expansion while maintaining everything that makes Pret work for both our customers and staff.
WHAT ON EARTH IS PRET? Pret operates a bit like a restaurant. We build kitchens in (or very near) every shop. You won’t find ‘sell-by’ dates on our fresh sandwiches and salads. Our milk and coffee is 100% organic. We offer our unsold food to charity at the end of each day rather than keeping it to sell the next day.
DOING THE RIGHT THING…NATURALLY. In 1986, Pret opened the doors of its very first shop. A shop with a mission. A mission to create, handmade, natural food, avoiding the obscure chemicals, additives and preservatives common to so much of the ‘prepared’ and ‘fast’ food on the market today.
PRET TODAY. In the last 30 years, we’ve continued to grow cautiously. Today, we have over 350 Prets worldwide with shops in the UK, USA, Paris, Hong Kong and Shanghai. We serve more than 300,000 customers every day, all of them looking to enjoy our fresh, healthy menu."
