Little Chef was a British chain of roadside restaurants; founded in 1958 by Sam Alper and Peter Merchant who were inspired by American diners.

[1] Little Chef began to face decline in the early 2000s, mainly due to over-expansion, meaning it could not properly invest in all of its locations.

[5] In early 2017, owners Kout Food Group sold the remaining 70 locations to Euro Garages who would convert the buildings into Starbucks, Greggs, Subway and KFC franchises.

[6] After Euro Garages' licence to use the Little Chef name expired, the remaining 36 restaurants became EG Diner in January 2018, and were either converted or closed by the end of October 2018.

[9] The earliest Little Chefs were basic, prefabricated constructions, with room for up to twenty customers, a staff of three to four, and provision for car parking.

[11] Later on, they were built with room for some sixty customers, while parking space was improved, and sign boards and other identifying marks were emphasised.

[13]Little Chef outlets were opened at larger Trust House Forte service areas on motorways and trunk roads.

[citation needed] The first Express outlet was at the Markham Moor service station (A1 North), though only as an addition to the existing Little Chef menu there.

[citation needed] Only five restaurants were ever built on the roadside, and the idea was redeveloped when Little Chef was taken over by Compass, with the Express take-outs being set up in food courts, including one in the Eurostar terminal.

[citation needed] In 1996, catering and broadcasting conglomerate Granada successfully mounted a hostile takeover for the Forte group.

[14][16] The Welcome Break chain was sold by Granada, with the Little Chefs at those motorway service areas becoming a similar table-service restaurant, branded as Red Hen.

[citation needed] In August 2004, Little Chef announced a plan to change its logo, to a slimmer version of "Fat Charlie," the chain's mascot.

[25] CEO Scoble added, "We get accusations that [Fat Charlie]'s overweight and a lot of people have also written in to say it was a small child carrying hot food, which they said was dangerous".

In October 2005, Little Chef was sold to The People's Restaurant Group (owned by catering entrepreneurs Lawrence Wosskow and Simon Heath) for £58 million, but with Permira retaining Travelodge.

As well as this, Wosskow and Heath learned that the existing Burger King franchises were trading well, but that a grab-and-go concept was also needed to compete with emerging takeaway businesses at forecourts.

[37] In December 2006, it was reported that Little Chef was undergoing serious financial problems; the business was said to be losing around £3 million a year and was struggling to keep up with rent payments.

[37] On 21 December, Little Chef announced it was in "urgent" rescue talks with a group of American investors, to secure funding.

Heston Blumenthal returned to Popham in February 2009 to review progress, and the owner promised that, if there was a profit within three months, the redesigned format would be spread to all branches.

[48] A Good-to-Go deli offering was introduced in the new concept restaurants, making bespoke sandwiches as well as takeaway meals appealing to customers on the move.

[50] On 7 February 2012, RCapital announced it was putting the Little Chef chain through "a pre-pack administration to offload a number of toxic leases".

Graham Sims, the chairman of Little Chef, said that suppliers and other unsecured creditors would suffer from the decision to put the chain through this process, which had been taken "reluctantly."

[53] In May 2012, Little Chef closed its headquarters in Sheffield, outsourcing its operational day-to-day support to Lt Pubs Limited in Norfolk, as well as its marketing and PR to Parker Hobart.

[54][55] The Barnsdale Bar South branch closed in 2012; however, for a short time, the former restaurant would house Little Chef's IT department.

These locations included Whitemare Pool, Rusington, Rugeley, Saltash (all of which also housed Subway franchises), North Muskham, Chesterfield, and Halkyn.

[67] The vision for Euro Garages was to convert, by January 2018, all Little Chef sites to their franchise partners' brands, such as Starbucks and Greggs.

[citation needed] During that period, the Little Chef brand suffered online criticism in platforms such as Tripadvisor, with complaints concerning "poor quality" food and the buildings not being kept clean.

[citation needed] The closure process of Little Chef was scheduled to be complete before the end of 2017, but was postponed until early 2018 due to timing problems.

[74] In November 2022, Loungers announced they were launching Brightside Roadside Dining to fill the gap in the market created by the demise of Little Chef and Happy Eater.

[80] A December 2004 episode of the British sitcom Max and Paddy's Road to Nowhere featured the Haydock Little Chef in which Billy 'The Butcher' Shannon (Craig Cheetham) threatens the waitress (Alex Hall) with a gun in order for him and his friends to be served after closing time.

[81][82] In December 2024, the Christmas Day special and final episode of Gavin & Stacey included a nostalgic reference to the former Little Chef in Feering, which was revealed to be the first job of the main character, Smithy, as a pot washer.