General Manager jobs in London

General Manager – New Opening

Coffee Service | Monument, City of London
£50,000–£60,000 + performance bonus | Full-time

Build the first one. Then help us build the rest.

Coffee Service is launching a new kind of grab-and-go business in the City of London. We are not building another coffee shop.

Coffee Service sits somewhere between functional food and drink, coffee, retail and the convenience store of the future — designed for busy City customers who want better products, greater convenience and very fast service.

Our offer includes speciality coffee, our own functional drinks, creative made-to-order beverages, functional grab-and-go food, customised options and a branded ready-to-drink range.

Our outposts are highly designed, digital environments. We use technology wherever it can make ordering, production, collection and the overall customer experience faster and better.

Our first outpost opens at Monument. Our second City location is already in development, with further locations being worked on. We are now looking for the General Manager who will open the first one.

The opportunity

This isn’t a conventional General Manager role. You won’t be inheriting somebody else’s store, team or way of doing things. You will help us build them.

You’ll recruit the opening team, lead training, bring our operating systems to life, launch Monument and take responsibility for making it a high-performing operation from day one. You will work directly with the team building Coffee Service.

We need someone prepared to roll up their sleeves. During launch, if something needs fixing, changing or doing, you get involved and make it happen. Then we want you to help us do it again. The person who makes Monument successful should not still be running one outpost as we grow. We want someone with the ambition and ability to take increasing responsibility across multiple locations and help shape how Coffee Service operates as it scales.

For the right person, this can become much more than a salaried management role. If you prove yourself and become a key part of building Coffee Service, we are prepared to offer an equity opportunity so that you can share in the value of the business you help create.

What you’ll do

• Open our first outpost successfully
• Recruit, train and lead the opening team
• Build a high-performance team and culture
• Deliver exceptional speed, consistency and product standards
• Take responsibility for sales, labour, productivity, stock, waste and store profitability
• Own food safety, allergens, health & safety and compliance
• Make our operating systems work in the real world
• Identify bottlenecks and fix them quickly
• Use technology and data to improve the operation
• Turn what works at Monument into a repeatable operating playbook
• Help prepare and open future Coffee Service outposts

Who we’re looking for

You are already a strong operator in a busy, high-volume food, beverage, grab-and-go, QSR or convenience environment.

Experience at a leading multi-site operator such as Pret, Itsu, LEON, Starbucks, Joe & The Juice, Farmer J or similar would be a major advantage.

New-opening experience would be particularly valuable.

You know how to recruit and lead good people, manage the numbers and maintain standards when things get busy.

You’re comfortable with systems, technology and data, but equally comfortable getting behind the counter and working alongside your team when needed.

You take ownership. You spot problems. You fix them.

Most importantly, you have the ambition to do considerably more than manage one store.

Coffee knowledge is useful, but this is not primarily a specialist coffee role. We are looking first and foremost for an exceptional operator.

What we offer

• £50,000–£60,000 salary, depending on experience
• Performance-related bonus
• The opportunity to join before our first outpost opens
• A genuine role in shaping the systems, standards and culture we take into future locations
• Direct access to the founder and senior team
• High-spec equipment, technology and purpose-designed digital outposts
• A clear opportunity to progress into a larger multi-site role as Coffee Service grows
• For an exceptional person who becomes a key part of building the company, the opportunity to participate in the longer-term success and value of the business

This won’t suit everyone

If you’re looking for an established operation with everything already figured out, this probably isn’t the role.

Opening a new concept is demanding. Things will change, problems will appear and you’ll sometimes need to solve things that aren’t normally in a General Manager’s job description.

But if you want to build rather than inherit, open the first location of a new concept, prove what you’re capable of and potentially become part of the business you’re helping to create, we’d like to hear from you.

Pay: £50,000.00-£60,000.00 per year

Application question(s):

• Do you have minimum of 2 years of management experience?
• Have you played a management role on new venue openings?
• Do you have experience working at Pret, Itsu, Leon or similar QSR?

Work Location: In person