NEW franchise holders say it is ‘business as usual’ at Pepe’s Bolton.

The Bolton News reported yesterday how the town's Pepe’s restaurant may be closing but that is not the case.

The Piri Piri restaurant, in The Vaults, at Market Place, which first opened in 2016 at the shopping centre, has continued to trade while the ownership has been transferred to a new franchise holder.

A spokesman for the new franchise holders said that the lease for the flame-grilled chicken restaurant was transferred previously and is trading well.

Their menu there still includes a range of classic burgers, wraps, pittas and salads, alongside their patented Piri Piri chicken strips, wings and legs.

Pepe’s, which first launched in the UK in 2004 when the Piri Piri market was still in its infancy, now has 94 stores nationwide, with the most recent outlet opening in the Gorgie Road area of Edinburgh.

Another is also pencilled in for a launch soon in the Leicestershire town of Loughborough.