Once upon a time — not so long ago, less than a decade — being a D&D restaurant meant something. Back then, Le Pont de la Tour and Coq d’ Argent were governed by swathes of the most moneyed City regulars; Sartoria offered a hangout on Savile Row as stylish as any of its neighbouring tailors; and Quaglino’s, until recently, was the place mere mortals were most likely to bump into Prince Harry or Mick Jagger.
But in recent years there has been a litany of what might be perceived as challenging news stories regarding the group, one of the country’s biggest on the restaurant scene. Most recently, its parent company Breal Capital and Calverton, a private equity partnership that bought D&D for £60 million in October 2023, was reported to be in talks to take over TGI Fridays. The chain is synonymous with budget dining and one that fails to even inspire positive reviews in the provinces. The Yorkshire Post gave a local branch in Leeds just two stars out of five last week in a terrifically scathing write-up.
