A dream and a disappointment

WHEN Peter Boizot opened his first Pizza Express in Soho's Wardour Street he promised Londoners their first taste of real pizza and ensured it would be by importing a pizza oven from Rome to provide the high temperatures the Italian chef demanded to make the real thing.

Boizot may have been the crusty base, but it was serial entrepreneurs Luke Johnson, Hugh Osmond and David Page who provided the financial topping when they bought in and then floated Pizza Express on the stock market at 40p a share in 1993.

The first four years were an investor's dream, the next five a roller-coaster ride. Johnson left in 1999 and his Signature restaurant group's current jewel is Strada, a London pizza chain. Hugh Osmond shortly afterwards led the £2.75bn buyout of Punch Taverns. Page is still at Pizza Express and once again chief executive after Ian Eldridge unexpectedly threw in the apron last February.

Between them they made more than £26m. One in 10 of Pizza Express's 300 restaurantsis in central London and 45% lie within the M25 area.

Analysts say the formula is tired - with young upstarts such as Strada, ASK and Zizzi taking away the profitable business.