The salad fast food chain’s founder and brains behind Tossed is far from the average business executive. Vincent McKevitt founded Tossed two years after graduating with a business degree and started out with his first eatery in London’s Paddington in 2005. A health-obsessed McKevitt spends more time at the gym than with his company’s numbers and calls his employees tossers. He may ‘leave the numbers’ to his finance team but he is serious about his business and he’s got everything to show for it.
Last year, the salad chain turned over £8.3m, delivering 9% comparable sales growth with a £389,000 pre-tax loss due to costs incurred in setting up two out of the three cafes in Dubai. Tossed has been capitalising on the increasingly growing wave of ultra-healthy ‘clean eating’ brought under the limelight by the likes of celebrities such as the Hemsley sisters, TV chefs Jasmine and Melissa as well as the iconic London restaurant The River Café. Tossed now has 24 sites and plans on opening 48 new locations over the next four years, expanding beyond overcrowded London lunchtime market.
At the time McKevitt launched Tossed not only was his concept a novel one – selling custom-made takeaway salads and soups to weight-conscious and time-strapped Londoners – there were not too many healthy options out there. Tossed stood out as the only eatery that served truly low-fat unprocessed and natural foods. Since Tossed opened its doors, other healthier eateries such as Pret, Leon and Starbucks have been riding the wave with healthy meal offerings. McKevitt does not consider these other brands as competition as Tossed remains the only eatery to offer purely organic, natural and low-calorie meals. “I’ve seen an all-natural, free-range egg, raw sugar brownie that has 650 calories in it,” he explains. “Yes, that might be natural, but it is massively unhealthy and that’s not cool.”
The Editorial Team, Point Franchise ©
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