Jeremy Roberts

Commercial Director and Co-Founder

Telephone : 01565 622320

Mobile : 07917 058922

Email : Jeremy

This is me......

I started my career washing dishes in my Dad's hotel and some say I peaked too early !! Hotels were in my blood so after school I went to Uni at Guildford where I spent four years pretending to study whilst enjoying myself far too much and therefor recieved the time honoured traditional reward for drinking and debauchery -  a Desmond (2:2 to the uninitiated)  Armed with my degree in Hotel Management and having spent a year learning how to speak Belgian French in Brussels, whilst  drinking lots of beer in the Grand Place and working at a posh hotel, I set off to the world of real work. Well sort of - a trainee managers job in London. I worked at the Cumberland Hotel Kitchens for 6 months - yes JB and anyone else who doubts my catering credentials I done my time - mostly chopping veg and carving hunks of meat but I did a bit of creative stuff too and loved every minute. I ended up via stints at various airport and west end hotels to a job as Food and Beverage Manager at the Cavendish Hotel in London and then moved up to Manchester as Hotel Manager of one of the airport Hotels. I then moved away from the corporate world of large hotel companies to the less corporate world of small hotel companies. I built and opened a new hotel (well not with my own two hands - it fealt like I did actually) in Lancashire and successfully ran a large nightclub as well as two hotels and then I met Tim .............  

This is what I've done .....

Tim and I joined forces in 1996 with a third partner Dave Hinds and set up Life Restaurants. We developed the Via Vita cafe bar - A mediterranean concept all blues and oranges very nineties and I think we started that trend. We worked with a brewery on this who bought us out of the business two years later. Next came Life Cafe and after Dave's departure, to build houses and reconcile himself with his first love (his guitar!), finally came The Living Room which we developed to a major high street brand before selling it recently to concentrate on our latest brands Gusto and Blackhouse (you can learn all about them on the Our Restaurants page). 

In the early days Tim worked Operations and Front of House and I did Back of House and the numbers. That worked for the first £30 million turnover but I got a bit fed up crunching the numbers and with people thinking I was an accountant (sorry Andy - not that that's a problem - but when you're not one !) so we found Andy Haigh to help us which has freed my time to concentrate on Commercial and Marketing aspects of the business I still have HR reporting to me and I also look after the Development side of things seeking out and negotiating new sites.  So you could say I keep pretty busy. However my most important job is one I have been doing for even longer than my day job........

This is what I'm all about.......

I am married to Jane - we met at University and we celebrate 20 years later this year - WOW ! where did that time go? and we have three fantastic kids Alex  (14) who has inherited his Dad's good looks and singing voice - WHAT ? actually the music talent comes from Jane although I do still sing in the corridors as many people will testify to ! (check out his band on www.myspace.com/jaws); Alice (12) who is going on 21 and loves anything and everything to do with horses and finally Zac (8) who is just good at anything involving a ball and beating up his Dad.

We live just outside Wilmslow. I am a tennis nut and get very aggrieved if I do not get my weekly thrash around the court. I am trying to play golf a bit but never have the time and I used to be pretty fit. Up until recently I ran a marathon (well two halves  - 6 months apart - every year !) but have been reduced to the Manchester 10k for the last two years  - well better than nothing I guess!

Apart from that I don't get the time for much else !!