Sea Salt and Sole is almost ready to unveil its long-awaited branch in Cove, the third in the Aberdeen business’s fish and chip shop empire.
There’s just one or two last details to get right before the big day. Including when the big day will be.
“We’re 99% sure it’ll be next Thursday,” says Daniel Gowans, the manager of the Cove Bay outlet, just down from Sainsbury’s on Charleston Road North.
“Or Tuesday or Wednesday the following week. Definitely.”
Daniel led the opening of Sea Salt and Sole’s second shop, in Bridge of Don. Experience has taught him not to rule out the possibility of something going wrong at the last minute.
As it stands, however, he’s confident everything will be ready for Thursday.
And if not, he’s sure the people of Cove can wait a little bit longer for a new chipper they’ve been expecting for some time.
“I’ve been in the shop for the last few weeks on a daily basis and there’s been plenty of locals popping their heads in asking when we’re going to open,” Daniel says. “The whole area seems very excited.”
A long journey for Sea Salt and Sole
Plans for the Cove Bay shop were hatched before Covid and next week’s opening is the end of a long journey for Daniel and Sea Salt and Sole owner Rikki Pirrie, who launched the original branch in Dyce in 2014.
The Dyce shop burned down in a 2016 fire, but Rikki rebuilt it and was back in business less than two years later. He added the Bridge of Don outlet in 2019, and both shops have won numerous awards and legions of fans along the way.
To open in Cove, Rikki and Daniel have overcome the coronavirus pandemic, multiple lockdowns and more recently rising costs for chip shops caused by unpredictable energy and fish prices.
“What with rising inflation and everything going on, we’ve been finding it tough,” Rikki says. “But we are really excited to open the Cove shop.”
The next Sea Salt and Sole?
Daniel says the new shop is a “milestone” that will continue to help grow the business, and perhaps lay the foundations for Sea Salt and Sole No. 4.
“There’s room in Aberdeen for a fourth, that’s for sure,” he adds.
Thursday’s launch will be Daniel’s second for the company. But he knows that this time he won’t see the long queues that greeted him when he opened the doors in Bridge of Don. Back then, because of the numbers flocking to the shop, people faced wait times of more than an hour for the first week of business.
This time, Sea Salt and Sole Cove Bay will accept online orders only for the first two weeks in a bid to protect customers from stubbornly high Covid-19 infection levels.
“At Bridge of Don, there were queues 60 to 70 deep,” Daniel says. “That’s not something we want to encourage in the current environment.”
A focus on quality
But with Sea Salt and Sole’s reputation for great fish and chips expanding as fast as its shops, the company can expect a lot of attention when the Cove branch starts frying.
“We do our best to focus on quality first and foremost,” says Daniel. “In terms of the specials that we do and some of the products we offer, we’re a little bit different from other chip shops.”
Sea Salt and Sole Cove will open on Thursday 24 March at 81 Charlston Road North, Cove Bay.