A Texas Joe’s-branded food offer has operated at BrewDog’s bar in Shoreditch since August and at the Scottish company’s Shepherd’s Bush venue since November.
Walters, who last year appeared on the Dragons’ Den TV show to seek investment for Texas Joe’s, said: “Sales are super great at both of them. Reviews are very positive. Now there’s a lot of people doing other variants of barbecue but we’re the only ones doing a simple, pure Texan style, fire smoked over solid oak wood and just with salt and pepper.”
He added: “Now we’re doing a summer instalment in Kentish Town at the Grafton [pub] and there are two standalone options that we’re looking to go into at the end of the summer.”
Sites in both east and north London are being looked at for the standalone venture. An earlier attempt to open a standalone site in Farringdon fell through.
Walters said there’s currently no plan to exit its operation at the two BrewDog bars. But he added: “When and if we get our stand alone we may choose to limit the menu at those locations or to move on from them. Essentially we are their food operations partners.”
He reiterated plans to eventually operate his restaurant concept across the country.
Meanwhile, Walters said he was “actively seeking” a distribution partner for getting its range of meat snacks into pubs. The company has so far focused on retailers, securing deals with Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Asda, the Co-op, and most recently Waitrose, where it has introduced an exclusive Hot n’ Spicy Lone Star Dogs sausage range, available from today.
Appearing on Dragons’ Den last year, Walters asked for a £37,500 investment in exchange for a 16% stake in the business. Investor Peter Jones offered £50,000 for a 24% stake, which Walters accepted, but the deal later fell through.