Member Article

Karma Kitchen launches Wimbledon site, announces McDonald’s as first partner

Karma Kitchen, the commercial kitchen operator, has announced the launch of its sixth site, a 14,682 sq ft, 26-unit strong location in Wimbledon, South West London. 

Joining sites across the capital, Wimbledon adds another key strategic location to Karma Kitchen’s growing portfolio. Close to densely populated areas like Wandsworth, Tooting, and Earlsfield, it creates opportunities for new partners to expand their production to community-driven, light-filled, and innovatively designed spaces. Much like Karma Kitchen’s five other locations, it offers flexibility and scalability, with businesses able to increase the size of their kitchens within a matter of days, responding quickly to growing demand. 

The Wimbledon location has a variety of kitchen floorplans, so partners can choose a space that's specific to their production needs. A Karma Kitchen unit can be as much as 97% cheaper and 20 times faster to occupy than a traditional space, and every site is designed with the staff in mind, including a central break area and naturally lit kitchens.

McDonald’s is the first partner to open at the site, taking a 2,000 sq ft delivery kitchen that it has customised to suit its own operations and production methods. McDonald’s decision to choose Wimbledon was based on a strategic assessment of its current location coverage; it also follows the brand’s opening of a delivery kitchen at Karma Kitchen’s Bermondsey site in March 2023.

Karma Kitchen offers enterprise businesses such as McDonald’s the opportunity to join at the build stage of new sites. The provision of the core infrastructure and the ability to custom fit-out kitchens enables larger partners to open new sites quicker and at a lower operational cost compared to self-build.

This news comes as Eccie and Gini Newton, Co-Founders of Karma Kitchen, were recently named within Business Leaders’ Top 32 Serial Founders, recognising the positive change that the company is spearheading in the food and beverage industry.

Regarding the Wimbledon launch, they commented: “Wimbledon represents another major milestone for us. It continues our growth within carefully selected sites, those that work to support not only the business development of each of the brands that sign here, but also give us the best opportunity to improve the welfare of their employees. We are excited to welcome operators to our new Wimbledon location, bringing Karma Kitchen to a new area of the capital to create success for the brilliant people and businesses that really make the food and beverage industry.”

Last year represented a landmark evolution for Karma Kitchen, with two new sites added – at Bermondsey and Crystal Palace– that more than tripled the total number of kitchen units available. Sustained growth also allowed the CPU operator to create Karma Credit, a brand-new financial product designed to support tenants, alongside new hires and partnerships with integrated software that makes the brand experience even smoother. 

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Nick Thornton .