Top Restaurants, Pubs & Bars Shortlisted for Prestigious 2025 Casual Dining Awards

Industry News & Q&As, Press Releases, Speaker Q&As

The Shortlist for the 2025 Casual Dining Awards has been announced. These esteemed awards recognise excellence in multi-site restaurants, pubs & bars and highlight their outstanding achievements in areas such as menu innovation, marketing, sustainability and more. Leading brands and operators including wagamama, Nando’s, Fullers, Hawksmoor, Young’s, Dishoom, Caravan, Loungers (and others) have made the shortlist. The Casual Dining Awards in association with The National Restaurant, Pub & Bar Show (the new name for Casual Dining) is organised by Diversified and will be held at the lavish 5-star London Marriott Hotel in Grosvenor Square on 24 April 2025. The 2025…

Speaker Q&A (2021): Mark Selby, Wahaca

Speaker Q&As

Ahead of his Keynote appearance at Casual Dining 2021, we spoke to Mark Selby, Co-Founder and CEO of Wahaca. The Mexican restaurant first opened its doors in 2007 to much anticipation, shortly after Co-Founder Thomasina Miers was crowned winner of MasterChef.   How has your business adapted to the challenges of these uncertain times? The unprecedented situation that arose in the early months of last year meant that we, alongside every business operating in the British hospitality industry, faced considerable challenges that were impossible to predict. Our wonderful teams showed such passion and commitment by adapting to whatever was thrown…

Jessica Parrish - Casual Dining Show &A

Speaker Q&A (2020): Jessica Parrish, restaurant & property expert

Speaker Q&As

Jessica Parrish, former commercial director at Time Out Market, is a food, restaurant and property expert with over 20 years’ experience working in the sector. She’ll be joining Peter Martin, founder of the Atlantic Club, and his remarkable panel of leading operators — including Richard Hodgson, CEO of YO!, talking about the opportunities, as well as the pitfalls to be avoided, when taking restaurant and bar brands ‘global’.

Oli Ingham, Wahaca

Speaker Q&A (2020): Oli Ingham, Wahaca

Speaker Q&As

Another new speaker for 2020 is Oli Ingham, creative marketing lead at Wahaca. He’ll be at the show on Thursday 26 March for The Casual Dining / Supersonic Inc Marketing Podcast panel, hosted by Mark McCulloch. It’ll also feature Libby Andrews from Pho, Anna-Marie Mason from Mitchells & Butlers, and Sara Stark from Dishoom.

Steve Phillips, Operations Director, Busaba

Speaker Q&A (2020): Steve Phillips, Busaba

Speaker Q&As

Meet Steve Phillips, operations director at modern Thai eatery Busaba. A new speaker for 2020, he’s looking forward to taking part in our ‘Casual Dining Ops Director’ panel session (on 26 March), alongside Bone Daddies’ Steve Hill, Browns’ Dave Lewis, Dishoom’s Brian Trollip and (session chair) Simon Stenning, founder of FutureFoodservice.com.

Chris Stagg - Peach Pubs

Speaker Q&A (2020): Chris Stagg, Peach Pubs

Speaker Q&As

Chris Stagg, operations director at The Peach Pub Company, calls Casual Dining “relevant, inspiring and fun”.  An experienced operator, with a strong people-focus, he boasts over 25 years’ in hospitality (including, prior to joining Peach Pubs in 2015, senior roles at Brunning & Price and Hall & Woodhouse).