Fortnum & Mason Plots London Expansion

For more than three centuries, its flagship Piccadilly store has served exotic foods at upmarket prices to millions of customers seeking a touch of quintessential Englishness.

Now, Fortnum & Mason is drawing up plans to open its first new standalone outlet in Britain since 1707.

Sky News can reveal that the premium retailer has signed a lease to open a shop in the former ticket hall at London's King's Cross St Pancras station, home of the capital's Eurostar rail terminal.

Opening later this year, the 2000 square feet shop will signal the ambitions of Fortnum's owners, the billionaire Weston family which also has a large stake in the company behind Primark, the discount high street retailer.

Although Fortnum's has previously opened concessions in airport terminals including Heathrow's Terminal 5, the standalone store will be designed as a fuller reflection of the retailer's brand, offering an at-table tea service as well as a takeaway offering for hurrying rail passengers.

"St Pancras is London's Grand Central Station," Ewan Venters, chief executive of Fortnum & Mason, said.

"It's a great opportunity. We feel the centre of gravity in London is moving north and east from Piccadilly.

"Thirty-five million people a year go through the station, and nearly a quarter of those people are going there to shop rather than to travel."

Mr Venters joined last year from Selfridge's, which is also owned by the Westons, and previously worked at Sainsbury's and Brakes, the food services supplier.

Best known for its vast range of loose-leaf tea and picnic hampers, Fortnum's eponymous founders were William Fortnum and Hugh Mason.

The holder of a string of royal warrants during its history, the store supplied dried fruits and preserves to serving army officers during the Napoleonic Wars.

More recently, the Piccadilly store has been the site of protests by UK Uncut tax protesters and campaigners against the sale of foie gras.

The opening of Fortnum's new store, which will create 25 jobs, will come as many of London's luxury retailers have defied the bleak economic environment to post healthy sales gains.

Fortnum's reported a 17.3% sales rise in December, buoyed by surging online orders and the continuing effects of last year's Olympics and Diamond Jubilee celebrations, the company said.

Harrods, which is now owned by a Qatari state fund, is also thought to have seen robust trading in recent months.