Best UK areas to open drive-thru restaurant
173 local authorities ranked by the Gera Business Location Score — real commercial rent, local wages, business rates and market density.
Which UK areas are best for opening a drive-thru restaurant in 2026?
The best UK area to open a drive-thru restaurant is Gwynedd (Wales), with a Gera Business Location Score of 84.2/100: premises at £304/m²/yr and local median pay of £25,217. Slough ranks lowest at 10/100. Ranked across 173 local authorities from 2025 government open data; re-dated annually.
Top 10 areas for drive-thru restaurant
| # | Local authority | Region | GBLS | Rent (£/m²/yr) | Local pay | Rates / 100 m² |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gwynedd | Wales | 84.2/100 | £304 | £25,217 | £13,133 |
| 2 | Blackpool | North West | 75.3/100 | £280 | £27,064 | £12,096 |
| 3 | North Devon | South West | 74.9/100 | £297 | £27,526 | £12,830 |
| 4 | Shropshire | West Midlands | 72.2/100 | £258 | £28,397 | £11,146 |
| 5 | Cornwall | South West | 72.1/100 | £316 | £27,006 | £13,651 |
| 6 | Westmorland and Furness | North West | 71.8/100 | £301 | £32,683 | £13,003 |
| 7 | East Lindsey | East Midlands | 69.4/100 | £329 | £26,724 | £14,213 |
| 8 | Thanet | South East | 67.2/100 | £312 | £27,076 | £13,478 |
| 9 | Erewash | East Midlands | 66.3/100 | £251 | £29,102 | £10,843 |
| 10 | Dorset | South West | 66/100 | £309 | £29,292 | £13,349 |
Filter by your budget
Set a premises size and monthly budget to shortlist the areas that fit.
Budget covers estimated annual rent (VOA rateable value × floor area) plus the 2026-27 small-business rates bill (43.2p multiplier), spread over 12 months. Real reliefs (e.g. Small Business Rate Relief) can reduce the rates portion further.
Best areas to open a drive-thru restaurant within £2,000/month
No local authority has typical premises of this size within that budget. Try a smaller unit or a higher budget.
Drive-thru restaurant by region
Frequently asked questions
- Where is the cheapest place to open a drive-thru restaurant in the UK?
- By premises cost alone, the lowest VOA rateable value among the 173 ranked areas is £251/m²/yr in Erewash. But the Gera Business Location Score also weighs local wages and market demand: on the combined score, Gwynedd ranks #1 at 84.2/100.
- How much is rent and business rates for drive-thru restaurant premises in Gwynedd?
- In Gwynedd, the VOA rateable value for this property type is £304 per m² per year. For a 100 m² unit that is about £30,400/yr rent, plus roughly £13,133/yr business rates at the 2026-27 small-business multiplier (43.2p) — before any Small Business Rate Relief.
- What data is this based on?
- VOA Non-Domestic Rating Business Floorspace (rateable value per m², 31 March 2025), ONS UK Business Counts 2025 (market density), ONS ASHE 2025 (local wages) and ONS mid-2024 population — all Open Government Licence v3.0, joined on the ONS local-authority code.
Opening a drive-thru restaurant? Stay compliant from day one.
Any UK business handling customer data must comply with the UK GDPR — and the EU AI Act if you use AI tools or sell into the EU. GeraCompliance gets your documentation done in a fixed-scope sprint.
Contains public sector information published by Valuation Office Agency and Office for National Statistics and licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: VOA Business Floorspace + ONS Business Counts + ONS ASHE (work geography) + ONS population estimates (2025 (VOA 31 March 2025; ASHE 2025 provisional; Business Counts 2025; population mid-2024), published December 2025).