WHAT do you do when the competition is thinking about opening up on your home patch?
''You either pull out and leave them to it or take steps to safeguard your position,'' says Glasgow restaurateur, Stephen Ellis. ''I decided attack was the best form of defence and opened my second restaurant.''
However, opening what has become one of Glasgow's most fashionable eateries takes money. To help raise the #500,000 needed, Ellis brought in two partners who had made their fortunes in very different arenas. Adrian Pocock is a successful commercial property developer, while his other partner is one of Scotland's most famous rock stars, Jim Kerr, of Simple Minds.
Thirty-two-year-old Ellis started with no experience of the restaurant trade. He had cut his teeth in the property world running a residential valuation service for the Glasgow Solicitors Property Centre in the early 1990s. He went on to try his hand at property development and built up what he describes as a ''comfortable portfolio of properties'' in Glasgow's fashionable West End.
The idea of moving into the restaurant business came from travelling abroad. ''I came across sushi and thought that this approach to preparing and serving food could work in Scotland, particularly if it was served in a western type of environment.''
Ellis opened Fusion in a converted butcher's shop in Glasgow's Byres Road in March, 1999. ''The restaurant was an entirely self-funded venture using capital generated from my property business. It was very successful, and still is, but the main problem was that it was too small.''
''I had tapped into a demand that Fusion on its own could not satisfy.'' Ellis was soon to hear rumours - unfounded - that a big London-based restaurant chain was looking at opening in Scotland. ''I quickly started to put together a funding package to open another restaurant to satisfy demand - I wanted to beat the competition to the punch.''
However, what Ellis had in mind was not a Fusion Mark 2. For a start, OKO - as the new restaurant was eventually called - was to be five times larger. ''A successful restaurant of this size generates in excess of #750,000 per annum. And with turnover of this scale you can afford to recruit - as we have done - two of London's leading chefs.''
The restaurant, which specialises in sushi, serves gourmet Far East Asian food on a conveyor belt. ''This approach is all the rage, not just in London but in big cities all over the world.''
The majority of the start-up costs came from Ellis himself, but he wanted to bring in other investors.
Pocock, who owns Glasgow-based property development firm, Scotia Land, saw the OKO concept as ''a good business proposition being put forward by a very capable guy. I could see how well his first restaurant had done''.
The three partners will not reveal exactly how much each has invested. ''Jim and I only have a small stake but I'm sure we will invest further as more restaurants are opened across Scotland and eventually in Ireland and the North of England.''
OKO opened in Glasgow's Ingram Street in July and number two will follow soon. A site in Edinburgh has been found and a restaurant will be opening early next year.
It is clear Ellis had his eye on the long-term when he was putting together the initial finance. ''I deliberately wanted to involve outside investors such as Adrian and Jim at an early stage. I wanted them on board right at the start so they could help me fund the future.''
Ellis rejects any notion that the fashion for sushi is simply a fad that will eventually fade and leave OKO in difficulty.
''Look around the world. Sushi has become established as a way of preparing food. We plan to be around for a long time.''
Stuart Paul lectures at Paisley Business School.
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