A WINCHESTER cafe has closed its doors for good.

The Greenhouse Cafe in Stockbridge Road has shut down after the company that runs it announced plans to focus its business on restaurants.

The cafe was formerly owned by the Orangery group, which is run by Mike Whiteley and his partner Nicola Lloyd.

They started the group in March 2019 and bought the Greenhouse Cafe two years ago.

They also run succesful restaurants the Winchester Orangery and Salisbury Orangery - and Mike said they are now looking at expanding the concept into other cities.

Mike said: "Like every business, it has been tough. It has been a difficult time but we are now looking at opening in different cities. The restaurants in Winchester and Salisbury are great, and we are looking around to open more like them.

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"The Greenhouse Cafe was great, it is a lovely looking place but we could not put what we wanted to do in there."

The cafe had its last trading days last weekend.

Manager Naeem Mojid, who joined the company in November 2021, said: "The Greenhouse was an amazing business and I'm really sad to see it go.

"It was popular but it was more for local residents rather than an attraction, so after it closed it meant we can focus on restaurants rather than a cafe."

Naeem, 24, said the pandemic and lockdowns kept the cafe from reaching its full potential.

In a post on Instagram, The Orangery wrote: "We just wanted to let you know the Winchester Greenhouse has closed and is no longer part of the Orangery group.

"We've really loved the time we've been open there and we've made some really great friends in our regular customers, but we will be focusing more on expanding the Orangery Group with more Orangery's [sic] alike to the Winchester and Salisbury Orangery.

"So in the future you'll see some new Orangery's around in towns near you."

Mike said that the Greenhouse Cafe unit has been taken over and that there will be new occupants soon.

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