Hospitality transformation · UK & Europe

Marcos
Georgiou

I build scalable operating models that restore control, improve performance and accelerate delivery. Through clear decision-making, strong governance, cost discipline and consistent standards — at pace, across multiple sites, across borders.

0+
International site launches
in 2.5 years
0
Countries opened
Jamie's Italian
£0m
Budget ownership
Deliveroo Editions

What I do

I give people
a reliable way
to succeed together.

Most hospitality businesses are good at opening. The concept, the launch, the excitement of something new. The harder part is making it work — consistently, profitably, without the founder in every room.

I notice where everyday work takes more effort than it should. Information entered twice. Approvals chased. A single person holding the knowledge that should be shared. Those details tell you where clearer responsibilities or simpler processes could help people do their jobs better — and reduce cost.

Whether a business is growing, struggling, or making its first move into a new market, the work is the same: understand what is already there, agree what needs attention first, and build something the team can carry forward without depending on me.

Turnaround & recovery
Stabilising distressed multi-site operations. Restoring governance, cost discipline and performance visibility when a business has lost control of itself.
→
International expansion
Building operating models for international growth — not copying the home market playbook, but designing something that actually works in the new environment.
→
Operating model design
Creating the infrastructure — accountability, standards, financial controls, decision rights — that lets a business grow without the wheels coming off.
→
Rapid scale-up
Delivering high volumes of new site launches without sacrificing standards. 200+ sites. 23 countries. The machine exists because I built it.
→
On menus
If your team has to explain the whole menu before a guest can order, adding another dish may be solving the wrong problem. Every dish is a promise the next shift must keep — and when those promises compete for limited prep space and attention, service slows and the business carries the cost.
On restructures
Before we change who reports to whom, I want to understand what your managers spend their time chasing. Removing a role might reduce payroll — but if its work lands on your GMs, we've simply moved the cost into overtime, missed checks and less time with guests.
On expansion
The business can afford another site. But can the operation carry it? Funding secures the location and fit-out. It doesn't create experienced managers or additional leadership attention. The real test is whether you can open the next site without destabilising the ones you have.

Career

Twenty years in hospitality, always in the room where the hardest decisions get made. Here's what I've actually done — not job titles, the work.

2020 — Present
MG Consultancy
UK & Europe · Self-employed
Director of Operations & Operating Partner
Board-level advisory and senior delivery across growth, market entry and turnaround situations. Working with founders, executive teams and investors who need operational expertise alongside their capital. My starting point is always the same: listen, understand the team's actual workload, and agree which risks need attention first.
Led operating model redesign and delivery for multi-site concepts and flagship launches
Built governance, financial and operational frameworks to support controlled scale
Stabilised a regulated department ahead of a leadership transition within three months
Senior interim leadership during periods of elevated execution and reputational risk
Jul 2025 — Jan 2026
GatepassUK
UK · Hybrid
Chief Product Officer
Executive ownership of product direction, systems architecture and operational integration for an AI-enabled regulatory review platform. Product strategy aligned to commercial performance, operational efficiency and risk control.
Led cross-functional delivery across product, operations and compliance
Established scalable digital frameworks to support growth, assurance and repeatable delivery
Jun 2024 — Aug 2025
Considerate Constructors Scheme
UK · On-site
Head of Product & Systems · Compliance & Risk
Senior leadership in a regulated, high-scrutiny environment. Strengthened compliance frameworks, risk governance and operational controls. Improved systems performance to support auditability, service quality and consistency.
Strengthened compliance and audit readiness in a nationally scrutinised environment
Partnered with external bodies to raise organisational risk and compliance maturity
Aug 2020 — Aug 2022
YourKitchen
Amsterdam · Co-Founder
Director of Operations & Co-Founder
Built the operating infrastructure that enabled multiple food brands to scale through ghost kitchen models — lower risk, higher upside than traditional brick-and-mortar. Designed the financial controls and supplier frameworks that protected margins at scale, and the shared process that let different teams coordinate delivery more consistently.
Helped several food brands expand into new markets with strong unit economics
Built high-trust supplier relationships and weekly inventory review systems
Managed budgets to consistently meet financial obligations and protect margins
Before 2020
Deliveroo Editions
UK & International
International Expansion — 200+ sites in 2.5 years
Delivered the global operating model rollout for Deliveroo Editions across multiple international markets. The thing that has stayed with me is what made it work: bringing construction, design, operations and partner onboarding into a shared process, so different teams understood how their work fitted together and could coordinate delivery more consistently. It wasn't the scale that mattered — it was giving people a reliable way to succeed together.
200+ international site launches delivered in 2.5 years
£14m budget ownership with full P&L accountability
Global operating model design, deployment and continuous improvement
Multi-market delivery governance across different regulatory and supply chain environments
Before 2020
Jamie's Italian
Global
International Operations — 23 countries, 28 UK openings
Led international operations across global markets during one of the most ambitious restaurant expansion programmes in UK dining history. Opening the first Jamie's Italian in Oxford showed me how much the practical details matter when bringing a new idea to life. What followed across 23 countries was an exercise in building operating models that could travel — without losing what made the brand worth taking there.
23 countries — operating model built to travel without losing what made the brand
28 UK openings — brand standards, QA and commercial controls embedded at pace
Cross-market quality assurance across diverse regulatory environments
Commercial controls, P&L discipline and performance frameworks across the international estate
Mar 2019 — Feb 2020
The Student Hotel
Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna
Food & Beverage Specialist
High-performing F&B operations across three European cities simultaneously. Led the launch of a new operation and concept in Berlin — full setup from scratch: processes, supply chain, kitchen layout, equipment.
Launched new F&B operation in Berlin — supply chain, layout, processes
Multi-city operations across Amsterdam, Berlin and Vienna

By the numbers
200+
International site launches
Deliveroo Editions, 2.5 years
23
Countries opened
Jamie's Italian international estate
28
UK restaurant openings
Jamie's Italian, brand standards embedded
£14m
Budget ownership
Full P&L accountability, Deliveroo Editions
20+
Years in senior operations
Multi-site, multi-market, multi-format
3
Months to stabilise
Regulated department, ahead of leadership transition

How I think
"Let operational proof shape what you promise."
A successful tasting proves the product can work. It doesn't prove the operation can repeat it profitably. Brand investment has a role early on — but fixing the identity too soon can lock you into dishes, service promises and packaging that the operation cannot reliably support. The hidden cost is paying twice: first to launch the promise, then to correct it. Before committing more to brand presentation, I want to see the offer run with different shifts, without founder intervention, with preparation time, waste and labour tracked alongside ingredient cost.
"A founder can be too accessible for the structure they are trying to build."
When team members bypass their manager and take every issue directly to the founder, the manager's decision becomes provisional. Authority weakens. Decisions slow down. People learn to escalate upwards rather than solve problems where they happen. The aim is not to make founders distant. It is to make leadership scalable.
"Every dish must earn its place operationally, not just creatively."
A dish can show a healthy margin on paper and still make the wider operation less profitable. Food cost tells only part of the story. I also look at ingredient overlap, preparation labour, execution consistency across all shifts, training dependency and whether customer demand actually justifies the complexity. A better menu should make it easier for the team to succeed.
"More people or new technology may be part of the answer — but I start somewhere else."
When a team is under pressure, I start by understanding their priorities, how decisions are made and how work moves between departments. Investment placed where it makes a lasting difference to both the team and the business is more valuable than investment placed where it is most visible.

In their own words
"Having known and worked with Marcos in a number of roles and companies over a twenty year period, I can say with confidence his knowledge and experience within the F&B industry is quite exceptional. He has shown great leadership — rolling out Jamie's Italian globally and then being responsible for opening all the Editions sites globally, including construction, openings and maintenance. Being able to orchestrate so many aspects of the business was only possible because of his ability to bring people and processes together."
RS
Rino Scalco
Global Head of Launch, Deliveroo Editions · Reported to Marcos directly

What I'm looking for

The right situation,
not just the right title.

Turnaround & distressed
Businesses that have hit the wall — operationally, financially, or both. Where the brief is to stabilise, reset the operating model, and rebuild the foundation. This is the work I find most meaningful and where my experience is most directly transferable.
International expansion
Brands making their first move outside a home market, or scaling across multiple countries at speed. I've built the operating model for this from scratch — twice. I know what breaks, what has to be different market by market, and what cannot be compromised.
PE-backed scale-up
PE-backed businesses where the operating infrastructure hasn't kept up with the ambition. As an operating partner or senior leadership hire, I bring the operational rigour that lets a portfolio company grow without losing control.
Permanent or interim
Open to the right full-time role — COO, Operations Director, Head of Operations. Also available for interim and fractional mandates where the business needs senior operational leadership for a defined period or specific challenge.
UK & Europe
Based in the UK. Open to European mandates — spent years based in Amsterdam, comfortable operating across multiple European markets and regulatory environments. Fluent in what it takes to run operations across borders.
What makes me say no
If we cannot agree on addressing the underlying issues, or on the authority and support needed to make progress — I would respectfully decline. Those foundations matter if I am going to be useful. I am direct about this because it saves everyone time.

Let's talk about
what you're building.

If you're working on something that needs serious operational leadership — or you're in a situation that needs fixing — I'm direct and easy to reach. No middlemen, no process.