Wingstop opens its first Bournemouth restaurant on Friday 18 September 2026, in the former Franco Manca unit at Bobby’s on Commercial Road. The site follows the chain’s 100th UK and Ireland opening in Inverness in August, and lands as master franchisee Lemon Pepper Holdings reports turnover of £216.4 million.
Wingstop in the UK and Ireland is run by Lemon Pepper Holdings, which holds the master franchise for the Texas brand across both markets. Accounts for the 12 months to 28 December 2025 show turnover of £216.4 million, up 73% on the previous year, and pre-tax profit of £23.5 million against £13.2 million.
The group closed the period with 86 sites after opening 29 during the year, and has since passed 100. Sixth Street took a majority stake in December 2024, in a deal reported at more than £400 million.
What opens on Commercial Road
The restaurant occupies Unit 2 on the ground floor of the Bobby’s building on Commercial Road, a unit previously trading as Franco Manca. It is the brand’s first site in the town, and it arrives a month behind the original plan: Wingstop had lined up Friday 28 August before pushing the launch back to mid-September while building work continued.
A free wings giveaway for the first 100 customers was attached to the original date. The menu is the standard Wingstop range of cooked-to-order boneless and traditional wings, tenders, burgers, sides and loaded fries.
A franchised brand that is not sold unit by unit
Wingstop is franchised in the UK, but not in the form most franchise candidates picture. Lemon Pepper Holdings holds the rights to the brand across the UK and Ireland and operates the restaurants itself, so a Bournemouth opening is the master franchisee adding a site to its own estate rather than an individual signing an agreement for a town.
The distinction runs through a large part of the UK market, where a brand can be genuinely franchised at group level and still have nothing on offer to a single-unit operator, which is why the brands in the fast food franchises recruiting in the UK listing are a different set from the fascias visible on the high street.
Good to know
“It is a franchise” and “a franchise you can buy” are two different statements in the UK, and the gap between them is wide. There is no franchise register and no statutory disclosure document to settle the question, so the only evidence is what the company publishes about itself: a live franchisee recruitment page and a stated entry route.
The group reached three figures on 21 August 2026 with a 3,746 sq ft, 92-cover restaurant at Inverness Shopping Park, where the first 100 customers were given eight-piece wings or boneless tenders. Chris Sherriff, chief executive of Wingstop UKI, said: “Opening our 100th Wingstop UKI in Inverness is a huge milestone for the business and a brilliant reflection of the momentum we’re seeing across the UK and Ireland.”
Up to 30 openings this year, and a first market abroad
The company has set out plans for up to 30 new restaurants across England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland during 2026, and has signed a development agreement to take the brand into Poland, the same country-by-country structure through which Wingstop itself entered the UK and which our in-depth guide to franchising in the United Kingdom covers.
The longer target set at the time of the Sixth Street investment was 200 sites within five years. Bournemouth is one of the smaller entries on that list, a town-centre unit inside a department store building rather than a retail park or a high-profile shopping centre, and it gives the brand its first south-coast presence between Southampton and Poole. Operators looking for a brand that does sell unit by unit can compare published terms across the UK franchise directory.
