Babel’s
Hidden halfway along the bustling George Street in Hastings Old Town, creative cocktails meet tasty sharer platters in the newest addition to Hastings’ bar scene at Babel’s Coffee House and Wine Bar. With a chic, cool interior that’s perfect for bottomless brunches or meeting your friends for an evening catch up over drinks, it has quickly become a go-to location, and is easily recognisable on your timeline from its tell-tale flower wall.
Owners of Babel’s Amy Trower and Ben Thwaites, had long talked about owning their own business - and amidst the flurry of lockdowns in 2020 they were able to make it a reality with a Start-Up Loan from Let’s Do Business Finance that helped the pair to secure vital funds to lease their premises in the Old Town area of Hastings.
Spanning two floors in a beautiful, listed building, and full of the character that is expected for a location in iconic Hastings Old Town, the space was transformed into the home of Babel’s in the summer of 2021 before opening their doors in mid-July.
The beginning of Babel’s
Originally the idea for Babel’s was to have a coffee shop, serving a finely curated list of cocktails to take advantage of the evening crowd, but after the first few weeks of opening they quickly realised that they weren’t a coffee shop; they were destined to be a bar.
“Coffee and Wine at no.9 sounds great, but we soon realised that we weren’t just a coffee shop – we were a bar!”
Amy has a long spanning background in hospitality, having worked in the industry since she was 17. Having worked her way up to become assistant manager at some prominent high street restaurants along the way, her and her partner Ben dreamed of having their own business – being able to put those long hours into their own place and put her experience to use.
Ben, being native to Hastings, enjoyed the Old Town area and saw its potential for Babel’s, so they were able to narrow down their search and think about how successful their own business could be in the area. They’d also looked at the other bars and cafes in Hastings to see what was missing, and where they could fit in. Nowhere else did bottomless brunch, and they identified that the area lacked a place that could easily transition from day to night.
They became more serious about their ambition for becoming business owners in the end of 2019, and by the time lockdowns arrived in early 2020, they had begun to view potential locations for Babel’s and look over business plans to see if their idea was viable.
The name ‘Babel’s’ came about from an autocorrect error between the pair, which then became an inside joke. When discussing what to name their business they joked about naming it Babel’s, and then they realised the name fit – B for Ben, A for Amy, and Bel’s for Mabel, their dog, who is spotted in decorations around the bar.
Once Amy was placed on furlough from her job, she was able to focus on making the idea of Babel’s a reality - and just at the right time, as the previous owners of the George Street property contacted them about potentially taking over the property. The opportunity was there, so they decided to go for it.
After receiving the keys for No.9 a mere two and a half weeks before they’d aimed to open in July, it became a community effort to transform the space to fit Amy’s vision – family and friends helped to completely repaint and refit the premises, with Ben’s own cricket team helping put together the new chairs the night before opening their doors to the public.
Another cocktail, please
Fast forward to today, Amy takes charge of running Babel’s day to day, while Ben works locally as a sales manager and looks after the financial side of the business in the background. Babel’s has become a popular and well known name on the Hastings’ nightlife scene, and has only got busier as crowds have picked up post-lockdown.
“It’s long days, but it’s different when it’s ours. The last place I worked I was doing 60,70 hours a week, but it wasn’t mine. I wasn’t getting anything from it, but these long days are worth it.”
They’re the only place in the area to offer bottomless brunch, and this has resulted in them being booked at least 3 weeks in advance. Amy says that the brunches, which run Thursday to Saturday, are primarily booked by women, but Babel’s as a whole is slowly attracting both female and male crowds.
The curated menu suits the nature of the business; other vendors on George Street already have their coined dishes; from pies at the Albion to curries at The Hastings Arms, so Babel’s wanted a simple menu with nibble type sharer platters and with occasional full dinner nights with visiting chefs using the kitchen. They don’t have a full-time chef on their staff, due to difficulty finding a full-time chef post-Covid in a difficult recruitment industry, instead Amy trained and undertook all the health and safety courses to take on the role herself.
Normally on quieter days it can be just Amy working, but on the busiest days a full team of 4 people will be working across the two floors, and she is already predicting they’ll need more staff for summer months.
With footfall increasing after COVID’s impact on the town centres, they’re hoping they’ll get their name out there a bit more, and only get busier as time goes on. If all goes well in the future, Ben and Amy have spoken about potentially opening another location in a nearby town.
“We’d like to get a year out of the way first, before we assess where it’s going and decide where we want to go. We had a joke about Babel’s Milan, but we might start with Eastbourne!”
Their start up loan journey
Amy and Ben were introduced to Let’s Do Business Finance by Amy’s brother, who had already received support from sister enterprise support organisation Let’s Do Business Group a few years before.
“The process was so simple, and in the end the loan bought us the lease for our premises.”
As an official delivery partner of The Start Up Loans Company, Let’s Do Business Finance can deliver Start Up Loans of up to £25,000 to aspiring entrepreneurs and businesses under two years old to support the launch of their business, and aims to support businesses both starting up and already established with financial services spanning from Start Up Loans and Business Loans, to brokerage.
To get Babel’s up and running, Amy and Ben applied for two start up loans of £25,000 each from Let’s Do Business Finance to secure £50,000 between them to buy the lease for the George Street property. They then used their own funds to get everything else together for opening, like money for painting the space and fitting out for their vision of Babel’s.
“We were looking at the bank before we knew about Let’s Do Business, and it seemed impossible to try and get the same amount of funding at such a good deal. It was simple, it was easy, and everyone at Let’s Do Business was so helpful. We wouldn’t be here without it”
Mentored by business manager Martin, they were helped along the way putting together the pieces needed for their application.
“It was a nice smooth process. We started the process in March 2020 and got approved at the end of March - it didn’t take long at all. It took a few weeks to get everything together and get our heads round doing the forecast side of things, but we had help every step of the way where we weren’t sure. Martin was so helpful in the whole process.”