Thu 24th Nov 2016 - Will Beckett becomes Rockfish chairman, food critic Giles Coren named as investor Will Beckett becomes Rockfish chairman, food critic Giles Coren named as investor: Rockfish, the seafood restaurant group founded and run by restaurateurs Mitch Tonks and Mat Prowse, has appointed Will Beckett, the co-founder and chief executive of Hawksmoor Group, to the role of non-executive chairman, effective immediately. Beckett was part of a private group that supported the business in a fund-raise in 2014 alongside other food and restaurant industry leaders John Barnes, Steve Leadbeater (chief financial officer at Two Sisters group) and Henry Dimbleby (Leon, Street Feast/London Union). The investor group also included the food critic Giles Coren, who became a fan after eating at The Seahorse in Dartmouth, Tonks’ seafood institution that regularly features amongst the best restaurants in the UK. Jonathan Dimbleby and Alexander Armstrong as well as the previous senior management team of Young’s seafood are also investors. Beckett said: “Having turned down similar opportunities in the past, I leapt at this one because I believe so strongly in the future of this company and the vision Mitch and his team have for Rockfish. I’d like to think I can help, but I can definitely also learn from what they’re doing. I’m really interested in restaurant companies trying to do integrity at scale, and I am really excited about being part of Rockfish doing just that.” The first Rockfish opened in Dartmouth in 2010, since when the focus has been to create a restaurant experience that makes seafood accessible and to serve seafood on the day it is landed, a day ahead of other restaurants away from the coast. Rockfish has quietly grown to five locations on the south coast over the past five years, and with locations at Brixham and Plymouth fish markets it claims it has restaurants closer to the source than any other in the UK. Tonks argues the first 24 hours makes all the difference. Sales are expected to reach £6m this financial year, with a new opening in Exmouth in December this year and two further locations in the pipeline for late 2017 and early 2018. This appointment is the latest in the assembly of a management team to execute the future expansion and Tonks’ vision to create a leading seafood restaurant brand founded on integrity of supply, including Ed Fevyer (ex-Jamie’s Italian) as operations director. The business is targeting locations that are on the south coast where Tonks firmly believes the best fish in the world is landed: “For me there is nothing better than enjoying a plate of simply cooked seafood, overlooking the water it came from. We have the best seafood here in the UK and Rockfish is all about that.” Of his investment, Coren wrote last year: “Fish and chips by the sea is the one thing we ought to be able to do (well), for the sake of tourists and locals alike. I (have) invested in a small fish and chip chain, which, at the time, had only two sites and now has four, all of which are more than 200 miles from London, which is committed to ethical and sustainable fishing and business practice. I put a fair amount of money in, relatively speaking: roughly what I am paid for a year of restaurant reviews, after tax. The business is not turning out to be as seasonally sensitive as I had anticipated and the shops are pretty much full year round with local people who have cottoned on. There looks like a chance of making some money. The broad financial implication is that the cash for every single review I write in The Times this year, regardless of where the restaurant is, will go into restaurant development in less well-off towns a long, long way from London.”