Meet Siberia Bar and Hotel
Sweet dreams are made of this… Aberdeen Inspired levy payers Siberia Bar and Hotel are getting ready to launch their exciting new venture on Belmont Street, Dough & Co, a doughnut shop with a difference that promises to be a unique experience.
We caught up with Stuart McPhee, co-director of Siberia, to shine a spotlight on the business and its vision for the future, including expansion into the building next door with Dough & Co set for a grand opening on 1 September.
Tell us about your business?
Siberia has been a hospitality business at 9 Belmont Street for about 40 years now in different shapes and sizes and developments and has weathered many storms.
The bar has capacity for about 400 people, offering food and drink seven days a week and we have live music from DJs on Fridays and Saturdays. We also have one of the best outside spaces in the city centre with views of Union Terrace Gardens.
Our hotel has 16 different room types, including two serviced apartments, in a prime city centre location and breakfast is included.
Our new project next door is Dough & Co, which will see us making fresh, hot hand-crafted doughnuts, as well as a range of other things from hot beverages to iced lattes and milkshakes. The central idea behind Dough & Co is a brand-new concept not just in Aberdeen but in the UK, that’s very much experience driven. You can see your doughnut made for you in the way you’ve asked for it, including the toppings and that’s what makes it your doughnut.
We will also be making sandwiches and soup daily for lunchtime and will be selling pies. Dough and Co will have a lovely space to sit in, but also a hatch so we can serve on to the street. You can then take your order to wherever you want and go on about your day.
What else is in your plans for the next 12 months?
The bar itself very much needs to constantly stay ahead of trends. We’re looking at how we can push the food menus forward. The destination menus we have done for Aberdeen Restaurant Week, such as our New York menu week and New Orleans menu week, is something we are keen to work with.
But mainly in the next 12 months we’re going to be launching parts of our expansion into the building next door, which includes the new doughnut shop. It will also allow us to create a new event space for the bar, which we are calling The Cavern. We are excited to bring that to market for private hire and for events like comedy, cocktail master classes or whisky tastings and so on. It’s a very interesting and intimate space. There is a lot of positive energy around what we are planning to do.
What are the benefits for you and your business of being an Aberdeen Inspired levy payer?
It gives us a sense of business community and we benefit from the network meetings – we fall under the Belmont Street BID network. At those meetings, we can pick up information not just about the activities of Aberdeen Inspired but also wider city centre information with regards to the developments on the roads or what the council are planning.
Being a levy payer allows us access to different networks and different conversations that wouldn’t normally be part of our day-to-day work in-house here at Siberia or next door at Dough & Co. It also allows us to engage with events Aberdeen Inspired run, with things like Nuart Aberdeen, the Christmas Village and also Aberdeen Restaurant Week. We can also get information about other events, such as Spectra.
What advice would you give to new businesses looking to set up in the city centre?
I would say it’s invaluable to have a knowledge of your space and a knowledge of who engages with that, from their demographics to age profile to dwell time. That is something Aberdeen Inspired has led on in the past and has produced the kind of data that would help businesses start up in the area.
The city centre has gone through a tough time, but I think it has bottomed out and is on an upward trajectory. There are people wanting to invest in the city centre and it is a good place to do business.
Something I would say to any new business coming into the area is to find yourself a point of difference, your unique selling point, then focus on that, push that and don’t be afraid to push hard.
What would be the biggest improvement to the city centre in your opinion?
The narrative around the city centre and its future has to be as positive as possible. That only helps businesses, it only helps ourselves and the residents who live here.
People want to have a positive experience, but I think that can be drowned out by ‘he who shouts the loudest’. So, I think the more there is a collaborative and community-led approach to ownership of a positive narrative for the city centre, the better. It is long overdue because there are more than enough positive stories out there.
Pictured-Stuart McPhee, Co-director of Siberia Bar and Hotel
When you’re not working where is your favourite place or thing to do in Aberdeen?
I spend most of my downtime in Methlick because that’s where my family is. When we do come into the city centre, we go to His Majesty’s Theatre a lot when there is something on for the kids.
Also, my fellow director Scott Anderson and I run a bi-weekly club night in Exodus, so it’s fun to go to that. But, and it’s a shameless plug here, my kids are very excited about the doughnut shop, so I’ll probably be spending a lot of time there.
Make sure to follow Siberia on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter @LakelandUK for all the latest updates!
Find more information about Siberia here. And check out the exciting Dough & Co here.
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