Historic Coventry venue cooking up new ideas to tackle coronavirus storm

A MICHELIN-STARRED chef spinning pizzas and a business owner delivering birthday cakes around the city - it wasn’t the first few months The GD (Green Dragon) had anticipated.

Having completed painstaking renovations of the 15th century Spon Street venue, owner Luke Truslove was set to return a famous landmark to the people of Coventry.

Launch night for the coffee shop/restaurant/bar, which is dripping in history, was set for Friday, March 20. But the coronavirus pandemic put paid to that.

However, the fledgling business decided to battle on. They had no choice. Fast forward two months and the GD is building a reputation which Truslove and his team certainly hadn’t planned for but are embracing with open arms.

“We didn’t qualify for the government furlough scheme or some of the other help as we’d only just started,” he said.

“I took on three core staff and basically said to them ‘if we want to get paid we’ve got to earn the money.’ I had a bit of contingency money but that was more if something broke down rather than keeping staff paid for four months during a global pandemic.

“We had to knuckle down and that’s what we came up with really.”

He added: “The first thing we did we switched to a bakery, doing choux pastry and bread. That went quite well. That went towards cookies and brownies. People wanted comfort food rather than artisan food. Instagram friendly food and it evolved from there.

“We were only getting orders during the day, so we thought, how do we maximise the whole day? So we put some savoury options in, starting with pizza, then a Wednesday wings night, people are loving that. We’ve got a whole fast food menu as well as the bakery options.”

Instead of entertaining guests in the historic setting, The GD team are taking their produce to peoples’ homes offering afternoon teas, dessert boxes and double pepperoni pizzas on their evergrowing menu.

“The response from Coventry has been really positive,” Luke said.

“People buying for other people has been the best thing. There’s a lady who every week buys cookies, brownies, muffins for the carers who are looking after her mother in a care home. It’s brilliant really.

“Then birthdays, people sending around cakes. One of the biggest things we’ve seen grow is our birthday cake menu. People want to do something nice. People are sending around three-four tier birthday cakes with messages on saying ‘thinking of you’ etc.

“It’s not set the world alight financially. But everyone has bought into it. It’s not the business I set out to make. I took on a chef who had worked at Michelin star restaurants and has five-star hotel experience.

“It’s kind of funny to see him spinning pizza on his fingers. The pizzas are good, everyone is raving about them, I don’t think he’s enjoying it but he doesn’t mind it, it’s another string to his bow I guess.”

Truslove hoped the wow factor of the impressively renovated interior would be his biggest selling point of the business venture, aligned with the produce on offer. Instead, it’s a growing social media following that is proving pivotal in helping The GD tread water.

“Our only route to market is through social media and watching it grow. We had 100 followers when lockdown started on Instagram and now we have nearly 2,000. It’s a good way to market but I would prefer it to just be open.

“Everything we make. Even the burger buns, it’s all made from scratch. You won’t get that with a regular takeaway service, they’ve just got to open up the packet. So there’s always something to capture.”

It’s not how Truslove envisaged the first two months of The GD’S life back in the city playing out, but the team are battling on through the lockdown and are gaining the support of the city.

It’s a digital audience he hopes will materialise in the real world and come through the doors when the world returns to normal.

“I said previously there is a blitz mentality and people need to keep calm and carry on and definitely the people of Coventry are helping,” he said.

“It’s good that Coventry is supporting us through this.”