The Company is led by its four founding shareholders, whose skills span the full value chain, supported by a governance framework appropriate to a capital-backed growth business.
|
Executive |
Role |
Mandate & profile |
|---|---|---|
|
Arjun Naidoo |
Executive Chairman |
Strategy, capital & franchising; 20+ yrs restaurant operations |
|
Priya Maharaj |
Chief Executive Officer |
Brand, culinary & operations; internationally trained restaurateur |
|
David Mthembu |
Operations Director |
Central kitchen, systems & supply chain; food-manufacturing expertise |
|
Isabella Jacobs |
Commercial Director |
Marketing, loyalty & digital commerce; franchise development |
Governance architecture
- A board combining the executive founders with investor-nominated and independent non-executive directors as the capital structure introduces external stakeholders.
- Committees for Audit & Risk and for Remuneration & Nominations, with monthly management accounts and quarterly investor reporting.
- A delegation-of-authority framework governing site approvals, capital commitments, franchise agreements and related-party transactions.
- Food-safety, brand-standards and service governance across company and franchise sites, protecting the premium positioning.
Key-person considerations and talent
As a founder-led hospitality business, the plan carries key-person dependency, particularly on culinary and operational leadership. Mitigations include documented recipes, systems and operating manuals (essential in any case for multi-site and franchise operations), a staff-training academy building a bench of chefs and managers, a second layer of functional management recruited as the network scales, and retention incentives linked to milestone delivery. Institutionalising the founders’ culinary and operational knowledge into systems is both a governance safeguard and a prerequisite for scalable growth.