What went improper at Pret A Manger after chain axed Club Pret scheme?

A decade ago, Pret a Manger was the British high street’s juggernaut celebrated by business bosses and food chiefs as the brand they most adored. 

Hailed for its ‘excellent’ service, Pret’s own co-founder Julian Metcalfe was so intent on keeping customers happy that he printed his own office number on every item sold in the coffee and sandwich chain in case they had any complaints. 

Opening its first store in London in 1986, it quickly became the key spot for office workers in the city for its combination of quick service, fresh sandwiches and organic coffees which helped to revolutionise the traditional lunch break. 

And in the years that followed, it enjoyed skyrocketing popularity, serving at its peak 1.4million coffees and day in the UK alone to 450 stores and expanding its empire across the world, building a loyal following. 

But that loyalty today came under threat following the chain’s shock announcement that it would scrap its ‘too good to be true’ Club Pret subscription scheme. 

The wildly popular membership gave customers five barista-made drinks a day for £30 a month.

The coffee chain broke the news today in an email to Club Pret subscribers in which they told customers it was ‘time to rethink how it works’, with the current deal having been running for the last four years. 

Launched at the height of the pandemic in September 2020, it was aimed at enticing customers working from their homes back out and into the store. 

But the scheme proved more popular than bosses had ever imagined, piling strain on the firm’s workers. Initially, Pret’s chief executive, Pano Christou, expected 2-3,000 people to sign up on the first day, but by 3pm that day the figure was already 16,500.

By April 2023, according to the company’s own figures, the subscription scheme was being used a staggering 1.25million times per week. 

Business chiefs claimed the scheme was so popular it was actually denting business – with some claiming it echoed the Hoover free flights fiasco three decades earlier, when the vacuum cleaning firm offered trips to America worth £600 for every purchase over £100.

On this occasion, the company had to row back on the offer when customer engagement far outstripped expectations.   

For Pret, a similar struggle was on the cards. With coffees costing upwards of £3 per drink, its Club Pret initiative meant customers could guzzle their way through £450 worth of drinks for just £30 a month. 

In reality, it is unlikely anyone claimed the full offer. However, the more industry subscribers could potentially offer out their leftover drinks to friends and family who aren’t paying to be part of the ‘club’. 

And that is precisely what happened, prompting Pret to clampdown on it and demand customers log in to its own app every day if they wanted to claim their allocated drinks – no longer allowing screenshots of the codes to be used.

However the app update caused some customers to mysteriously lose their loyalty bonuses sometimes when they logged in – inspiring a wave of complaints.

The huge demand created by the app reportedly forced Pret’s staff to go into overdrive in a desperate bid to keep up with customers. 

There were even stories of some staff members switching off the iced coffee machines and telling customers they were broken because they didn’t have time to make them all.

One former Pret employee claimed it put workers under ‘unbelievable pressure’. 

‘They suddenly threw thousands of extra people at the staff without the right equipment to cope with the demand,’ the worker said, reported the Telegraph. 

‘It has been heartbreaking for the staff and for the customers because trust and loyalty between them were always very important. Now the staff are having to deal with a good many people feeling upset.’

But Pret is not the only cafe-style store to struggle to make a subscription service work. Krispy Kreme, which is owned by the same parent company, has just scrapped its own Sip & Save subscription scheme, launched in May 2021.

The director of the British Sandwich & Food to Go Association Jim Winship said he does not expect other companies to follow Pret’s example of a subscription scheme. 

But Pret faced opposition as soon as it was founded in the 1980s from a failed independent shop in Hampstead. It was three years before the co-founders managed to open its second outlet. 

Since then co-founders Julian Metcalfe, an old Harrovian, and his university friend Sinclair Beecham, have spent decades building up the brand and its reputation.

The pair wanted staff to be chosen for their cheery disposition rather than experience, and allowed employees to give away coffees at random to customers they felt deserved it.

Customers also felt they were part of a social movement because unsold food was given away to homeless people and food banks – something that is still done today. 

Metcalfe sold his stake in Pret in 2018, and the company is now 90 per cent owned by JAB, the Luxembourg-based investment vehicle of the Reimann family of Germany.

He recently told The Telegraph the company has ‘let down’ the customers he so hard to attract.

The company’s darkest moment came in 2016 when teenager Natasha Ednan-Laperouse died after suffering a severe allergic nut reaction to sesame seeds contained in a Pret baguette.

She was travelling home with her father and her friend from a dream trip to Nice on July 17, 2016. 

She had an artichoke, olive and tapenade baguette just before boarding the British Airways flight but within an hour she had lost consciousness and went into cardiac arrest.

The high-street chain had failed to label its packaging and disclose that the sandwich contained sesame seeds – a fatal ingredient for Natasha. 

The coroner at the inquest into her death slammed Pret’s ‘inadequate’ food labelling and said the business had not taken the issue of food allergies seriously enough. 

Natasha’s Law was passed in the fallout of the tragedy which has forced all food retailers to clearly label all foods packed and produced on their premises with a complete list of ingredients.

Before the law came into place, retailers were exploiting a gap in legislation which meant producers did not have to put ingredient or allergen labels on food that was made on-site. 

Pret was also forced to close all of its vegetarian-only stores and convert them into normal outlets due to a slump in demand for meat-free sandwiches.

The move will bring an end to the concept that was introduced eight years ago as veganism’s popularity continues to wane.

At their peak, there were 10 Veggie Prets across the UK and, in 2019, the High Street brand had been planning to convert more until the pandemic grounded their ambitions.

But perhaps Pret’s biggest challenge came in 2020 when Covid struck – killing off dozens of businesses that relied on workers on their daily commute. 

A wave of lockdowns saw the closure of offices, and in turn, a steep drop in Pret’s regular footfall – putting a hole in its finances.

In 2020, the chain warned of ‘material uncertainties’ as sales plummeted causing them to permanently closed 74 outlets in the UK and 22 in the US.

Pret’s chief executive said the impact of social distancing had been ‘severe’ and has changed consumer habits.

The British sandwich market is worth £7 billion a year, still smaller than its pre-pandemic levels of £8bn. Many workers are continuing to work from home on Mondays and Fridays in particular. 

But Pret remains positive about its future and has claimed the business is in good health and has recovered well since the pandemic.

In July last year Pret returned to profitability for the first time since 2018, with revenue reaching £790m.

In the first half of 2023 sales reached £429m, up 20 per cent from 2022.

And since 2021 the company has opened in seven new markets (now operating in 18), beating its target of five new entries by end-2023.

This year Pret is expected to open just under 150 locations globally, and it will be the second year in a row where Pret has opened more shops outside of the UK than in the UK. 

Internationally Pret plans to reach 1,000-1,500 locations in the coming years and will have over 500 shops in the UK by the end of 2024.