A Mayfair fish and chip shop is giving black cab drivers free fish and chips every Tuesday in November, in a gesture of thanks to a trade it says is under growing pressure.
The Mayfair Chippy will hand out free takeaway fish and chips to the first 50 black cab drivers who turn up at its Mayfair shop on each Tuesday throughout November. Customers who arrive by black cab will also get buy one get one free on the restaurant’s signature Mayfair Classic dish, redeemable with a valid black cab receipt from 26 October to 31 December.
The restaurant, which has branches in Mayfair and Knightsbridge and opened in 2015, says black cab drivers are already a trade under “significant pressure” — and that the pedestrianisation of Oxford Street is set to further affect the routes they have used for years.
Almost 1km of Oxford Street, between Orchard Street and Great Portland Street, became traffic-free on 26 October, with buses, taxis, private hire vehicles, cycles, scooters and pedicabs all banned from the stretch. Shoppers had the road to themselves for the first time on Monday, while cyclists were seen riding past the new bollards within hours of the ban coming into force.
For cabbies who have worked the West End for years, the closure changes familiar pick-up and drop-off patterns around one of the busiest shopping streets in the country. Deliveries are restricted to between midnight and 7am, and new bus stops have been placed on Wigmore Street, Henrietta Place and Cavendish Place, around 200 metres from the old stops.
The Mayfair Chippy says its offer is a way of giving something back. Since it opened in 2015, black cab drivers have reportedly continually helped put the restaurant on the map for tourists and locals across the city, recommending it to passengers and bringing visitors through its doors.
The initiative aims to “spread extra delicious joy to drivers and customers this Autumn”, the restaurant says.
For drivers, the deal is simple: be among the first 50 black cab drivers at the Mayfair shop on a Tuesday in November and the takeaway fish and chips are free. There are four Tuesdays in November, so up to 200 free portions will be given away over the month.
For passengers, the buy-one-get-one-free offer on the Mayfair Classic runs much longer, from 26 October right through to 31 December — covering the whole of the Christmas shopping period, when the West End is at its busiest. The only condition is a valid black cab receipt, which ties the discount directly to having taken a cab to the restaurant.
The timing is no accident. November is the run-up to Christmas in the West End, when footfall surges and cabbies work some of their longest weeks of the year. A free hot meal on a Tuesday, and a reason for passengers to choose a cab over other ways of getting there, is aimed squarely at that period.
Black cabs have been part of London’s streets for generations, and the trade has faced sustained pressure in recent years from changing travel habits and competition. The restaurant’s offer does not claim to solve any of that — it is, by its own framing, a thank-you, and a small one at that. But for drivers working the West End through the autumn, a free supper on a Tuesday is the kind of gesture that tends to be remembered.
The offer runs at the Mayfair location only. Drivers hoping to claim one of the 50 free portions will need to get there early on Tuesdays in November, and passengers claiming the buy-one-get-one-free deal will need to hold on to their cab receipt.
