Cheesesteak Company set to get tastebuds tingling with city store
A NEW shop based in Blackwood is set to open in Cardiff.
The Cheesesteak Company is coming to Cardiff’s Crwys Road, with signs having appeared in what was formerly the Cathays Fish Bar.
The Cheesesteak Company, owned by Amjid Saddiq, is based in Blackwood and sells a wide range of food from the Classic Philly Cheesesteak to Buffalo Wings.
Amjid started the business from a trailer in Nantgarw back in 2019, and the business has expanded from there.
Amjid opened his first permanent franchise in Blackwood and is now set to open a second in Cardiff.
“I had an idea and it just took off from there. Now we’re a franchise with our first store in Cardiff,” Amjid said.
The Cheesesteak Company sells a range of dishes using rib eye steak, including steak sandwiches, burgers, and loaded fries.
After six years of living in Wales, Amjid says he is excited to see the business expand.
“I moved to Wales about six years ago and opened up a restaurant on City Road,” Amjid, originally from Glasgow said, adding that he appeared on a BBC documentary about City Road.
Amjid opened the Kebabish Grill on City Road, having sold his house in Glasgow to invest in it, but said that he gave it up after two years. Instead, he began working in kitchens when he had an idea.
“I thought I’d have one more roll of the dice and basically I had an idea of doing steak sandwiches because I felt there was a niche in the market,” Amjid said.
He bought a trailer and secured a site on an industrial estate in Nantgarw to trade. However, after opening in 2019, the area was hit by flooding.
“The floods affected everything for about two or three months,” Amjid said, adding that he was considering giving up the trailer.
“But I just kind of stuck it out and managed to ride it out,” he said. “Just as we were getting through that, Covid hit.”
However, as Amjid’s business operated as a takeaway, he says he was able to stay open.
“That helped us out a lot and established our business,” he said.
“We just got this massive following and became an overnight success.” Amjid said that, from that point, the business was able to take off.
Amjid, 45, opened a second trailer in Aberdare after customers coming to the Nantgarw site encouraged him to expand.
Not long after he opened his trailer in Aberdare, Amjid was able to take an opportunity to expand to an industrial estate in Bridgend to open a third site.
“The long term goal was to get a permanent bricks and mortar unit,” Amjid said.
A year into running the Bridgend site, Amjid inquired with a friend working on a development in Blackwood about whether there were any units for him to open up a permanent site.
After finding a site on the high street, Amjid was able to start working on achieving his long-term goal.
“I reached that point where my longterm goal was almost in sight,” he said.
As he was working on setting up the unit, Amjid said his friend approached him to become his business partner, wanting to expand the business further. Cardiff is now the second bricks and mortar site for the company, with Amjid now having closed the trailers.
While Amjid said he focussed on selling steak sandwiches and loaded fries from the trailers, he has been able to expand the company’s offerings to include burgers, wraps, rice boxes and a range of different side dishes.
“We always make the food to order, so there’s nothing pre-made or anything like that,” he added.
Amjid said he wants to ensure all the food is fresh and wants to give customers the “best experience possible” with high quality ingredients.
Amjid says the team are currently renovating their new Cardiff site and are “on track” to open in around four weeks.
As well as expanding to Cardiff, Amjid says that he is planning to open a Newport site by the end of the year.
Amjid says his success is down to the support of his wife.
“She’s been very supportive of me from when I opened the trailers and I wouldn’t have been able to do it without her,” he said.
“She’s the backbone of the business. There were times where I was going to give up, but she kept on pushing me.”