All interviews – Page 55
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InterviewsShepherd Neame CEO Jonathan Neame: ‘Hancock is a latter-day Champagne Charlie’
The government should expect a “huge political backlash” on the other side of the pandemic for its “disproportionate” and “arbitrary” restrictions on the pub sector, Shepherd Neame CEO Jonathan Neame has said.
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InterviewsSwingers co-founder Matt Grech-Smith: ‘Our long-term plans remain the same’
Swingers, the London-based competitive socialising concept, will continue to push on with its international expansion plans despite the ongoing uncertainty of the coronavirus pandemic, Matt Grech-Smith, co-founder of parent operator the Institute of Competitive Socialising has said.
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InterviewsEnd of lockdown 2 has ‘limited spark’ and ‘different feel’ to lockdown 1
Hospitality’s second reopening weekend, marked by notably low footfall and cautious consumer behaviour, has had a “different feel and sentiment about it to that of lockdown 1,” UK Hospitality CEO Kate Nicholls has said.
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InterviewsLoungers CEO Nick Collins: ‘We have a real role in improving high streets’
When discussing the enduring success of the Loungers business, “well-hedged” is not a phrase CEO Nick Collins says he would necessarily use, but he recognises it’s a good one.
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InterviewsDishoom co-founder Shamil Thakrar: ‘Delivery won’t be dine-in’s poor relation’
In usual times, an ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ approach to operating a business as successful and celebrated as Dishoom makes sense. But 2020 has been anything but usual, and despite its initial reluctance to drift from the carefully curated roll-out program that’s seen the Indian restaurant concept emerge as a well-established industry darling over the last ten years, in March the business announced it would be launching a collection and delivery option, for the very first time. It now boasts seven delivery-only kitchens, opening its latest in Brighton last week, and as co-founder Shamil Thakrar tells MCA, the business doesn’t intend to stop there.
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Interviews
Punch Pubs CEO Clive Chesser: Pub restrictions ‘disproportionate and unfair’
The restrictions imposed on community wet led pubs in tier 2 are “disproportionate,” “unfair,” and “wrong,” MCA’s The Conversation has heard.
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InterviewsGreene King CEO Nick Mackenzie: ‘People in government don’t understand pubs’
Greene King CEO Nick Mackenzie has described the uncertainty facing pub tenants face as “incredible,” saying “they do not deserve to be treated in the way that they have been by government.”
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InterviewsUK Hospitality CEO Kate Nicholls: ‘We need compensation over support’
UK Hospitality CEO Kate Nicholls has urged operators to issue a “carpet bombing” of letters expressing industry concerns to MPs ahead of the vote on Johnson’s new tiering restrictions later today.
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InterviewsPret director Briony Raven: 'We've amazed ourselves with the speed we've done things'
Pret a Manger officially launches Dinners by Pret this week after a soft launch period. Part of a multi-channel strategy of bringing Pret to customers’ homes, the hot food offer is available via Just Eat, Deliveroo and UberEats. UK food and coffee director Briony Raven discusses the project.
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InterviewsHawthorn CEO Mark Davies: ‘We want to be the number one community pub company’
Hawthorn is an ambitious company, that’s something chief executive Mark Davies is very clear on. Speaking to MCA following the group’s half-year financial results, which reported its 700-strong estate had outperformed the market for the six months to 30 September 2020, Davies is in the enviable position of being able to look ahead, and he isn’t holding back in his plans for the business going forward. “We want to be the number one community pub company,” he says. “If anything, the pandemic has endorsed our strategy of focusing on community pubs, and our intention is to keep at it. We have the team to do it and the desire, so watch this space.”
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InterviewsM&B CEO Phil Urban on the ‘cruel irony’ of tier 3 restrictions
It’s an oft-told observation that coronavirus and the work from home directive has led to empty city centres but thriving suburban neighbourhoods.
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InterviewsBao co-founder Shing Tat Chung: ‘Diversify, prepare, and avoid being too optimistic’
Should there ever be demand for a hospitality ‘how to’ guide on responding to a global pandemic, the Bao team could write a pretty strong one. Since those initial virus rumours began to circulate at the beginning of this year, the London-based Taiwanese restaurant group didn’t waste any time in mobilising a response. In March, the then four-strong brand – with restaurants in Soho, Borough and Fitzrovia, plus a ‘Bao Bar’ in Hackney’s Netil Market – announced it was due to open its first all-day dining concept, Café Bao, in Kings Cross. Not ideal timing, but as co-founder Shing Tat Chung tells MCA, undeterred by the Kings Cross set back and estate-wide closure, the business set about pursuing a different avenue of opportunity.
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InterviewsPeter Martin: ‘We must mobilise against the government health lobby’
The hospitality sector must mobilise against the government’s “health lobby” in using pubs and restaurants as a scapegoat for transmission “with very little evidence,” CGA vice president and MCA contributing editor Peter Martin has said.
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InterviewsImbiba partner Darrel Connell: ‘You can’t predict the future in a period of flux’
Imbiba partner Darrel Connell has advised businesses against drawing “too many conclusions about what the future will look like” with the country still in the midst of the pandemic.
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InterviewsPizza Hut Restaurants CEO Jens Hofma: ‘CVA a necessary evil’
Pizza Hut UK’s company voluntary arrangement (CVA) was a “necessary evil” and has left the business in “a more robust position,” CEO Jens Hofma has said. Speaking at MCA’s the Conversation, Hofma revealed that the business had made several attempts to find an alternative solution to deal with outstanding lockdown rent debts with landlords, but the hostility of some left it with “no other choice” but to turn to a CVA. But with landlord break clauses still a live issue, he added that the business has come up against a number of newer operators “circling the estate” to see if they can “tempt landlords to go for the new kid on the block rather than sticking with tenants who’ve been around for decades.”
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InterviewsVagabond MD Stephen Finch: Forced shutdown ‘almost preferable’ to previous restrictions
The restrictions imposed on hospitality in the past few months couldn’t have been more at odds with the concept of London-based bar group Vagabond Wines, managing director Stephen Finch has said.
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InterviewsMeatliquor co-founder Scott Collins: ‘We’ll pick up stronger than we left off”
In February, Meatliquor was set for a record 2020. Eight months into the financial year, sales across the burger concept’s eleven sites were already higher than in any other, and with four months to go it was set to see unprecedented year-on-year revenues. “It was going to be a boom year,” co-founder Scott Collins tells MCA. “But that was all wiped out.” Describing the implementation of tier 2 across the capital as its “tipping point” for the drop-off in dine-in, the business nevertheless continued to remain viable through its delivery, click and collect and new meal kit offer via at-home food delivery company Great Food 2U. And given the opportunity for a pause in its everyday operations, Collins explains that its priority in lockdown was twofold – to reopen, and to improve.
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InterviewsYoung’s CEO Patrick Dardis: ’We’re going to see this through very comfortably’
Normally when a CEO of listed pub company suggests a set of financial results are not really about the numbers, it would raise the eyebrow of an attentive journalist.
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InterviewsVarious Eateries director Hugh Osmond: ‘We’ll be opening new sites as quickly as possible’
Coppa Club operator Various Eateries’ prospects are better than ever despite the latest month-long lockdown, director Hugh Osmond has said.
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InterviewsHugh Osmond: ‘If you want to prevent deaths, you start with the places people are likely to die’
Various Eateries director Hugh Osmond has criticised the government’s mass testing strategy as a “giant propaganda exercise,” arguing that ministers initially failed to utilise the approach where it could have had the biggest impact.