Stray’s at The Ossington

Bringing Newark's best coffee into Newark's own Coffee Palace...

Since we first moved in back in 2003, we’ve loved being at our Middlegate store. 20 years on and it’s time to move on.

So, early 2024 sees us moving over the road to The Ossington, a building we consider to be the gateway to Newark. Originally designed as The Ossington Coffee Palace, we’re really proud to be bringing that vision back to life some 140 years later.

And while we’ll miss our original home, this new site will allow us to grow and develop Stray’s into our 21st year and beyond.

So what’s in store, instore?

We’re known for making the best coffee in Newark and will continue to offer the same, fab coffee and cake as we have done for the last 20 years.

Add to that, we’re updating our breakfast menu and will be serving this from an earlier opening time. We’re also updating our daytime menu, which will also see the addition of a fab pizza menu!!

What will our new hours opening be?

For the first quarter of 2024, our planned hours will be:

Mon to Wed – 7:30am to 7:30pm – breakfast menu, daytime menu, early evening menu & cocktails
Thursdays – 7:30am to 10:00pm – breakfast menu, daytime menu, evening menu, cocktails
Fridays/Saturdays – 7:30am to 12:00 midnight – breakfast menu, daytime menu, evening menu, cocktails, live music til 10:00pm
Sundays – 9:30am to 10:00pm – breakfast menu, daytime menu, evening menu, cocktails – live music from 12:30pm to 3:00pm

What about ‘live’ lounge?

‘live’ Lounge will also be extending to both Friday and Saturday nights too, with doors open from 5:30pm and live music til 10:00pm on both nights. Our First Friday jazz sessions will no longer require tickets, but as with all events, we recommend you book a table in advance, to secure your table.

We hope you’ll be as excited about our news as we are and can’t wait to serve you from our new home at The Ossington from early 2024. Until then, we’ll continue to do our thing from our home of 20 years on Middlegate.

Our brand is changing slightly for 2024. We’re so proud of our new home, that we wanted to bring it into our logo, without forgetting our 20 years’ at our Middlegate home, where the Stray’s name comes from.

Stray’s has been family-owned and run since 2003 and after 20 years, we’re not only changing our address but the business also welcomes new a MD, Mark Pinnock to the helm.

Mark has over 45 years of experience running businesses and will head up the management team at Stray’s. Assisting Mark is Stray’s Office Administrator Lara Gratton. Lara has over 12 years experience in the hospitality sector, managing small independents as well as multi-bar 1000+ capacity venues.

The management continues with everybody’s favourite front of house events manager Colby Christopher Williams, alongside Dan Lovatt who will be running the floor at our new venue.

Executive Chef Warren Jones returns to the culinary team, headed up by Simon Burgess, alongside Shanice and a yet-to-be confirmed expanded team of chefs to manage the new menus.

And of course, our superstar team of Baristas including Sarah, Nate and Abigail will be joined by all your favourite Stray’s floor team as well as a whole new bunch of people!

Stray’s co-founder Mat Short will still be on hand, consulting as Operations Manager, making sure the business continues to thrive under this new leadership. When asked why the change, “I’ve been doing this for over 20 years now – I’m tired and ready for new challenges” said Mat…