Dean: So who is Dean? Dean Wilson, as you said, director of food and drinks for the restaurant group looking after TRG concessions, which is a pillar of the business. So it’s split into three pillars. We have TRG concessions, which look after the travel hubs within the UK. We have Brunning and Price Pubs, which is a pub division with pubs all across the UK, and we also have Wagamamas. But my focus is purely looking after the UK airports and any travel hubs that we have within our business. I’ve been cooking since 1985, sounds like a very long time ago. Started off as a young boy, left school on a Wednesday and got a job on a Friday in a gentleman’s club in Piccadilly, a well-known one called the Reform Club. I started off not as a chef but as a maintenance porter, changing light bulbs and painting walls. And then after six months, I got talking to the kitchen team and just fell in love with the chefs and the kitchen. I asked if I could do a couple of days a week in there, and before you know it, a year later, I was in the kitchen of the Reform Club and just learning a bit, and then started my cheffing career.

So you worked your way through London?

Dean: Yeah, back in 1985. I worked my way through London, took a job wherever I could to get experience. I did work experience, went to college, started off in a little restaurant, and always had goals I wanted to reach every couple of years. Then I went to Westminster College, which was well-known back then, still is now. I worked with people like the Roux brothers for a little while in the City of London. I worked with Mark Hicks, a well-known chef that runs the Caprice and the Ivy. Then I worked my way into some fine dining restaurants, a well-known one called Greens in Mayfair, which was Simon Parker-Bowles, which is connected to the Royals. I went on to work with Oliver Peyton at the Atlantic Bar and Grill, Candlewick Room restaurant. And then I took a step back from fine dining and casual dining and went into a wine bar group in the city. I spent quite a few years there.

Dean: Then I worked with a company called Benugo, well-known in London. They look after museums across the UK, Scotland, and places like that. I ran the V&A museum for a year and a half, and then got asked to join TRG. Nearly 11 years ago, I came on as a development chef. I had a vision of what I wanted to do in the airports because airport food had the perception of being frozen, expensive, and not good quality. So I had a vision to change that within TRG concessions within a couple of years, and I challenged the teams and their past practices, which were very successful. I nurtured the team to work the way I wanted, and I’ve been here 11 years. Covid changed things. We had quite a few sites, then shut them down, and then reopened. My role changed. I became the head of food, and about a year and a half ago, became director of food and drinks, looking after the whole of the concessions business and Barburrito as well.

And that’s where we are today.

Dean: Yes, it’s been a long career. A long time, yeah. 1985 to now. Very long.