Bewiched Coffee now operates 15 outlets across the UK | Photo credit: Bewiched Coffee

UK café chain Bewiched Coffee has opened its first franchised store in partnership with Heart of England Co-operative Society. 
 

The new outlet is part of Heart of England Co-operative Society’s retail food store in Balsall Common, Birmingham. 
 

Bewiched Coffee, which now operates 15 outlets across the UK, announced the collaboration in March 2022 with a target of opening 15 sites with the retailer over the next three years. 

The two companies are expecting to launch at least two further partnership stores next year before five new Bewiched locations slated in 2023. 

The coffee chain is targeting reaching 40 Bewiched sites by the end of 2026, including 20 drive-thrus by the end of 2025. 

“It looks like a bit of a game changer to us. Our wider teams have continued to break all of our records on customer feedback and we are staying focused on trying to scale our business while retaining great service at the heart of our offer,” said Matt Fountain, Managing Director. 

In September 2022, Bewiched Coffee launched its new express format, offering ‘freshly roasted artisan coffee’.  

Its entry into the automated coffee market, which Fountain said is ‘dominated by incumbent market leaders whose offer is often impacted by the length of time that has passed since the coffee was roasted’, is part of plans to operate 40 Bewiched Express machines in retail locations across the UK by the end of next year.  

Costa Coffee has operated Costa Express self-serve coffee machines in third-party shops, petrol and service stations, leisure sites and offices since 2011, when it acquired Coffee Nation for £59.5m ($77.3m). In June 2022 the UK’s largest coffee chain announced the roll-out of 1,100 new Costa Express self-serve machines across the UK, capable of serving both hot and iced beverages. 

Pret A Manger made a foray into the UK’s premium self-serve coffee market in October 2021 with its ‘Pret Express’ machines, while food-to-go and coffee chain LEON launched its own branded self-serve coffee kiosks in 68 EG-operated petrol forecourts across the UK in July 2022.