Swift MD: ‘The DNA we’ve built is incredible’

Following the departure of Swift co-founders Mia Johansson and Bobby Hiddleston, Coral Anderson has moved into the role of managing director. She spoke to us about the bar’s commitment to classic cocktails and implementing a four-day week across the business.

Anderson has worked alongside Johansson and Hiddleston since Swift opened in November 2016. “The role I’ve taken on is essentially just a continuation of the role I’ve been doing for about five years,” she explains. “It’s been a fairly smooth transition. Bobby, Mia and I have been doing this together from the beginning – not always as closely as we have been in the past few years. Certainly since Covid, we’ve been working as a three, as a unit.”

Alongside Anderson’s promotion, Connor Bloomfield has taken up the role of head of bars, after being bar manager at Swift Shoreditch. Bloomfield will lead drinks development and service. “He is the most hospitable person you could hope to meet,” adds Anderson. “He’s so naturally warm and inviting, but he also has an incredible drinks palate – he has a real finger on what makes a ‘Swift’ drink.”

Anderson’s reign won’t mark a huge turning point for the brand. “The DNA we’ve built for Swift is incredible – obviously – and it’s not something I would want to change,” she explains. “But as a bar director, you have to constantly be thinking about what is relevant and what is good for the bar going forward.

“The DNA of the bar would never change – who we are and what we are will never change.”

A focus on people

As for what Swift’s DNA is, she cites the brand’s “unwavering commitment to classic-style cocktails in the face of growing rotovaps”, as well as its strong focus on people: “When you work in hospitality, your main focus is the guests. You’re doing everything for the guests. But since Covid, I’d say Swift changed from a hospitality business to more of a people business; we put a huge amount of investment into making sure the staff are happy so that they can give the best of themselves to the team.”

This includes implementing a four-day week for every staff member across the business (with the exception of Anderson herself). “We’re just trying to change the hospitality model into a more sustainable one,” she explains. “We now have three parents working at Swift, which is a really high number for a hospitality business, never mind a bar.

“We’re making sure the people we employ can work with empathy and give the best possible service, because they are happy.”

She believes this focus on people is a big factor in Swift’s success. “One of the biggest economic challenges – and the biggest economic sinks – is staffing. It costs you money to on- and off-board people and train people to a standard where they can work efficiently.

“By giving people a nice work life, people stay with us for a really long time; when people leave, it’s to do something deeply cool. We’ve got someone who is moving to Japan, for example – it’s never just to go and work in another bar, which I take as a real point of pride, and I know Bobby and Mia did as well.

“Investing in staff and giving people a nice working environment to the best of your ability is a really good use of your money, and actually saves you money in the long term.”

Plans for the future

There are currently no plans for a fourth site, she admits, but “you never say never”. Swift’s third site, in Borough, opened in October 2022, less than two years after its second site, in Shoreditch.

“We never intended to open Borough when we did,” she explains. “I feel like I’m talking about a child, saying it was unplanned to open Borough as quickly as we did after Shoreditch – but the site came up and it was just too perfect, so we decided to go for it.

“We never intended to open bars in really quick succession – that’s not what we’re about. We want to make sure that if we open another bar, it will be the best possible version of Swift, at a time when we’re ready to do it, and when the staff are ready to take on that challenge. You never want to overwhelm anyone or dilute the brand too much.”

There’s also no denying that the current trading environment is extremely difficult, with British bar chains failing to report any sales growth this year, according to CGA data. Swift is one of the few success stories in the industry, but it still has its struggles.

“I think it’s about finding the balance between value and the product you’re putting out and working as smartly as you can with what you have,” muses Anderson. “It’s about giving people a premium product, but at an as accessible a price point as possible – which is increasingly more and more difficult.”

She points to Swift’s aperitivo menu as an example, which uses more aromatised wines and vermouths, which are traditionally cheaper – and have a lower ABV – than spirits. “It means people can still come out, meet up with friends and have a cocktail from Monday to Friday, between 3pm and 6pm. It’s incredibly well-made and as thought out as a £17 (US$22) one, but it’s more accessible.

“Right now you need to be as accessible to as wide a pool of people as possible, because there is so much competition and people unfortunately don’t have the expendable income. Cocktails are the first thing you cut off that balance sheet in hard times – even if you work in the industry.”

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Author: Lauren Bowes