‘It’s transformed my life’: Teacher turned entrepreneur prepares to open forth Teesside café

A former school teacher turned entrepreneur is set to expand his empire.

Paul Charlton spent 16 years working as primary school teacher in schools across Middlesbrough and Darlington, eventually becoming a deputy head. But in 2017 he decided it was time for a change. Despite loving working with the youngsters, he felt the bureaucracy of teaching had become too much and he was ready for something new.

The dad-of-two always had a passion for good food and set his sights on a café, opening Cook’s Café inside the Captain Cook Birthplace Museum at Stewart Park in 2017. Since then his business has gone from strength to strength and in the last year he has launched two new venues on Teesside, and a third is just around the corner.

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After five years of running the popular Stewart Park venue, the 44-year-old was ready to expand and had been searching for the right spot for his next café. He ended up finding not one, but three new venues and launched himself into expansion plans.

He explained: “It’s bit of an expansion but I was waiting for the right opportunity to come up. I’d been looking for quite some time then this opportunity arose.”

The second Cook’s Café opened at Billingham Forum in November last year, followed by the third at Stockton Splash in February and now his fourth venue is set to open at Tees Barrage in the coming weeks. It hasn’t been plain sailing for Paul, who often completes renovation work himself which has led to 15-hour work days, but he is looking forward to reaping the benefits.

He added: “There’s not enough hours in the day. I won’t lie it’s a tough job running all of them and it’s a big adjustment but you’ve got to put the hard work in to get the reward.”

Each of the venues offer the same menu which includes barista coffee, cakes, tray bakes as well as hot and cold food. If that wasn’t enough to juggle, Paul also caters for events like weddings, christenings and funerals. He often travels to festivals with his pizza tent Puck’s Pizzeria where he offers stone baked slices for customers.

Despite the challenging and long days, Paul says he has “never looked back” and is glad he went for such a drastic career change. He puts his success down to one simple philosophy that he has stood by ever since his launch.

“My philosophy is that we use good quality ingredients, we have reasonable prices and we have good customer service,” he said. “That’s the philosophy I’ve had from the beginning and that’s how I want my business to run.”

With his latest venture set to open in just a matter of weeks, he is looking forward to getting the Barrage venue open and settling into life as a booming business owner with four venues to his name.

Paul said: “It’s actually transformed my life. In terms of being your own boss, at school you’re pretty much tied into term times, this allows you a bit more freedom and flexibility and although it’s probably more hard work, you’re your own boss so you can have that.”

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