North East breakfast brand Pablo’s has signed its first franchise agreement and will open in London in January 2027, inside the Bloodsports bar in Covent Garden. The bao bun concept, which runs six shops in Tyne and Wear and Edinburgh, is targeting at least five more franchised openings by mid-2027.
Founded in 2020 by Emma Dent and Edward Evans, Pablo’s, which trades as Pablo Eggs-Go-Bao, serves breakfast bao buns and hash browns. Its own website lists six shops: Whitley Bay, two in Newcastle city centre, Sunderland, and Inverleith and Morningside in Edinburgh. All of them open from 7am to 2pm. The brand also sells DIY breakfast kits nationwide and runs corporate catering, and says it serves more than 300,000 customers a year.
A kitchen inside a Covent Garden bar
The first franchise partner is Scott Collins, the Meatliquor founder who opened Bloodsports in Covent Garden in early 2025. Under the agreement, Pablo’s will run a permanent kitchen inside the bar from January 2027, serving its bao menu from 7am to 2pm, with local delivery and corporate lunches on top. It will be the brand’s first site outside the North East and Scotland.
The deal is a shop-within-a-venue arrangement rather than a standalone unit, which keeps the kitchen inside an existing hospitality business, a lower-capital route into a site than the standalone units most fast food franchises in the UK require.
Five more franchised sites by mid-2027
Pablo’s is building its franchise programme with consultancy Presman & Colard, which is in talks with further prospective franchisees, a stage at which most brands set out the terms published across the UK franchise directory.
The target is at least five more openings by mid-2027, which would take the estate to a minimum of 11 sites. Neither party has published a franchise fee, an investment level or target regions. The founders describe franchising as the route to becoming a national brand, with partners who share their ambition to scale the concept.
Dent and Evans base the case on their existing shops. They say the North East and Edinburgh sites show “huge local demand for innovative and high-quality baos”, and that the next step is to “replicate our success through franchising” with new, strategic sites. Beyond the shops, the brand already sells nationwide breakfast kits and runs corporate catering. In London, the Covent Garden kitchen will add local delivery and corporate lunches to its counter trade. Mander said he saw potential for Pablo’s to follow other brands “venturing out of the North East”.
A small brand testing the franchise route
At six shops, Pablo’s is entering franchising at an early stage, with a menu built around bao buns and a morning-only trading window. The Covent Garden kitchen will be the first test of that format outside its home markets. The next signals to watch are the names and sites of the further franchisees, and whether the January 2027 date holds.
