From a small market stall in London in 2013, to now eight thriving bakeries and two baking schools established in Dubai, Riyadh and Jeddah, you would have heard about Bread Ahead, even if you haven’t had the chance to taste the world-famous doughnuts yet.
By mid-2025, the brand plans to expand to 12 locations and three bakery schools, but the journey to becoming a cult following started with humble beginnings and one-man band/founder Matthew Jones.
Cosmo ME sits down with “The King of Doughnuts” to discuss all things dough over a pistachio doughnut freshly baked here in Dubai.
Cosmo ME: Could you tell us a bit about your background and how you got into the world of bread and doughnuts?
Matthew Jones: I was a very industrious child. I was always making things. I was not an academic but I wanted to be a chef ever since I can remember. I left school when I was 15 and worked for two years in a restaurant and it was fabulous. The minute I put an oven on I just loved being in a kitchen. I loved learning new skills, I loved chopping things and slicing things and cooking things, so then I embarked on a career for 15 years in the London food scene as a chef in the Michelin world of the 90’s, and worked for some great chefs like John Torrode.
I started off in the main kitchen, and then I ended up in pastry, because nobody else wanted to do pastry. I was making lemon tarts, bread and butter puddings, and classic English desserts and then I started making bread. I love the bakery world, making croissants, making sourdough, then I left to set up my own business.
Cosmo ME: At Bread Ahead, you are most known for your viral doughnuts, how did that come about?
Matthew Jones: We were playing around with doughnuts from the very beginning in Borough Market and it was clear that we had developed a really, really good product.
The first day we made 40 doughnuts, we put them on the counter, and they sold, and then the next day we made 60, and they sold. We’ve developed flavors, we’ve developed our bakery school and our doughnut courses. We have a really cult following around us who literally follow everything we do. And if we launch a new doughnut flavor, it’s a big deal.
Cosmo ME: What’s your favorite doughnut flavour?
Matthew Jones: Crème brûlée or pistachio. I like the classic vanilla and the homemade jams are lovely. But actually, I like everything we make because I only will put things on the counter that I love otherwise it won’t be there.
Cosmo ME: What was the process like for bringing your UK-based business to the Middle East?
Matthew Jones: It’s essential to find the right partners to do things. We’re working with an ambitious family from Saudi. It takes time to plan and to train staff, but the recipes in the products are identical – same flour, same eggs, same butter.
*In between scoffing a pistachio doughnut*
Cosmo ME: Why do you think Bread Ahead works so well in this region?
Matthew Jones: I think there’s a real affinity with London brands. We’ve always had a big following of customers from the Middle East – during the summer, one in three customers in our Borough Market queue come from the Middle East. The flavours that we represent are very real and very new. The Middle Eastern customer loves sweet things and we do sweet things very well. We tick a lot of boxes for the whole of the GCC.
Cosmo ME: What have you noticed are the biggest differences between the UK market and the Middle Eastern Market?
Matthew Jones: Longer trading hours is a great thing about this region. But the same things that are popular in the UK are popular here. The top selling items are the vanilla doughnut, blackcurrant cheesecake doughnut and the sourdough pizza.
Cosmo ME: Could you describe Bread Ahead in three words?
Matthew Jones: A community bakery?
Cosmo ME: Perfect, that’s three words! What’s been your biggest pinch me moment to date?
Matthew Jones: I have quite a few but one of my favourite’s is when we finally opened in the Mall of the Emirates after six months of building it. On opening day I saw us next to some global brands in one of the busiest malls in the world, and I thought we’ve actually done this. I only started this business from a market stall in London, trading three days a week. We went from a team of one (me) to a team of three, now we’re a team of 200 staff in the UK and I’ve grown the business without any investors or partners. I still work in the bakery in Borough Market everyday.
Cosmo ME: If you weren’t doing this, what do you think you’d be doing?
Matthew Jones: I would have been making something, like clothes or pianos. All my family work in industries like woodwork and the creative space.
Cosmo ME: Do you have any advice to someone who’s starting out in this industry and wanting to follow in your footsteps?
Matthew Jones: I started from the very beginning, and I think it’s very important to do that. You need to learn to walk before you can run. Go and work in a restaurant for a couple of years and do the real work before you can do the glossy stuff.
It was a long journey to come from leaving school 15 years to where I am now. But I’m glad I did it that way, because that’s what actually gives substance to the brand. The flavours have meaning, and all of that is woven into the DNA of this business.
A lot of people want results straight away, you might get a result, but it won’t last very long. We’ve been in business after 12 years – if you go to Borough Market, there will be a queue right now for our doughnuts.
What are your red flags in business?
Cleanliness is key – I never want to see any clutter. Also you’ve got to keep your eye on the percentages, on the payroll, on quality control, on the wastage, on food costs. There are so many little red flags that all add up to be one giant red flag.
When you look at the mechanics of any successful business it doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, the basic fundamentals have got to be adhered to. In the food industry, it’s all about consistency, the same product every time. It’s about opening hours, it’s about customer service. It’s all of those little details. They’re all the little spokes on the wheel. But you take a few of those spokes out, it just will fall apart.
Cosmo ME: What’s been your biggest life lesson so far?
Matthew Jones: When I was a younger guy, I was pretty chaotic. I grew up in the rough and tumble of the chef world and I partied a lot which is great when you’re in your 20’s, but when I was in my 30’s, I was partying too much.
I had a previous business before Bread Ahead which was a disaster. I took my eye off the ball and that taught me a hard lesson. Just don’t get complacent and don’t take things for granted. If you’re into sport, and you want to hold that title, you have to keep doing the laps and the training otherwise you lose your edge and you get taken out. It’s a competitive market, there’s a load of unseen work that goes into a business.
The top CEO’s for big companies are people who are constantly driving it 24/7 maybe not physically, but mentally and that’s pretty exhausting. You have to accept that when you don’t get the result you want, or even when things go badly wrong, there’s only one person who can fix that, and in my business, that’s me. There’s nobody else who will come along and save it.
Cosmo ME: Can you tell us about what’s next for Bread Ahead?
Matthew Jones: We are opening in Manila, Philippines later this year. And we are very close to finalising New York, which will be a game changer. I love New York, I go there a few times a year and I get a lot of inspiration from the city. There’s such a thriving food industry there and there’s always cool pop-up’s happening.
Cosmo ME: When are you bringing the crème brulee doughnut to the Middle East?
Matthew Jones: You can get it in Jeddah and in Riyadh, I’ll have to see about Dubai. If customers keep asking, maybe we’ll bring it.
If you’re moving house soon, be sure to read our guide.