Harvester (restaurant)

Harvester is a casual dining restaurant chain in the United Kingdom. The first, The George Inn, opened in 1983 in Morden, south-west London. The chain, set up by Courage Brewery to compete with Whitbread's Beefeater restaurants and Grand Metropolitan's Berni Inns, is currently run by Mitchells & Butlers.

Early history
Courage Brewery, who were owned by Imperial Tobacco had expanded the Harvester brand by converting 70 sites. Imperial were purchased by Hanson Trust plc in 1986, and Courage was sold as part of Hanson's divestment of Imperial's non tobacco interests, with the company being purchased by Elders Limited, the Australian brewer of Foster's Lager. Elders sold the Harvester brand onto Trusthouse Forte.

Bass
On 21 July 1995, Bass bought the seventy eight restaurants of Harvester for £165 million from the Forte Group. Whitbread had offered £150 million to acquire the chain. Most Harvesters were in the South East, and Bass had plans to rebrand other restaurants (such as the former Innkeeper's Fayre) elsewhere in England as Harvesters. When Bass divested its brewing division in 2000, the chain was looked after by the renamed company, Six Continents, until 2003.

Mitchells & Butlers
On 15 April 2003, Six Continents was demerged into Intercontinental Hotels Group to operate the hotels, and Mitchells & Butlers, for pubs and restaurants which had 127 outlets.

In 2006, Mitchells & Butlers acquired 239 standalone Brewers Fayre and Beefeater sites without a Premier Inn or where planning permissions for Premier Inn could not be obtained from Whitbread. These sites were converted into Harvester, Toby Carvery and other pub/restaurant brands. In 2008, it bought 44 more standalone Beefeater and Brewers Fayre sites, in exchange for 21 Express by Holiday Inn hotels.

Return to television and radio advertising
For the first time in ten years, Harvester Restaurants spent nearly £20,000 on advertising on both television in the United Kingdom, and radio stations in July 2010. The advertising campaign was part of a general shift within Mitchells & Butlers, to focus on businesses that were food led. As part of the marketing campaign, they also run "free ice cream vouchers when you order main meal" campaigns periodically.