We are the leading energy management team in the hospitality sector with over 50 years of combined experience
Richard Felgate
Simon Cocks
Richard was Head of Energy Management at Mitchells & Butlers, one of the largest multisite hospitality companies in the UK. There Richard started from scratch transforming energy from being a cost that the business just incurred, to being one of the biggest opportunities for profit within the P&L.
There was a transformation in the energy efficiency of the 1,500 buildings in the estate, a big behavioural and cultural change with the 40,000 employees and the creation of a hugely capable energy team. There were the regular challenges of gaining board support, securing funding and convincing the sceptics, but the results were impressive multi million pound annual savings and relative energy reduction of over 20%. Richard also has considerable experience outside of Mitchells & Butlers.
As the former Chairman of the Energy Managers Association (EMA), he has knowledge of many other sectors, working with government to influence future legislation and placing energy management at the heart of successful businesses.
In 2014 he left M&B to establish EnStrat which has since rebranded as the Hospitality Energy Saving company and has continued to make significant savings with all sizes and types of hospitality businesses. Richard is also a registered Energy Savings Opportunity Scheme (ESOS) lead assessor.
Simon has extensive energy management experience within the hospitality sector. He’s an expert on buildings and equipment, both from an operational point of view – training the teams that work within the buildings how to achieve the greatest efficiency; and also from a technology point of view – how to make them as efficient as possible.
He has carried out assessment and trials of most available technologies and then project managed roll out programs of all scales, from just a few sites to multi million pound projects covering over 1,000 sites.
His background as a pub / restaurant manager means he understands how buildings and equipment are used and often abused! He knows how the teams operate and will soon identify any weaknesses in proposed solutions.
Simon’s a Fellow of the Energy Managers Association and has won awards for innovation in energy reduction technology.
Dr Sam Mudie
Martin Schwaller
Dan Speakman
Sam is quite unique in the hospitality industry having completed a doctorate in energy reduction in commercial kitchens. This ground breaking research has showcased how energy efficient kitchens of the future may be specified, together with highlighting many current opportunities. Sam also has extensive practical engineering and technical knowledge and is able to combine this with energy benchmarking, computational modelling and systems analysis to deliver impressive savings. She recently gained an "Energy Conscious Organisation (EnCO) Practitioner" qualification thanks to her experience in behaviour change programmes.
Mario Morariu
Mario has spent all of his career managing and analysing data. He thrives on digging into large data sets, establishing patterns, finding anomalies and then producing insightful reports and recommendations.
He’s fluent in a wide range of software and data management systems, from the traditional Microsoft packages to software most of us have never heard of!
Data is at the heart of what we do, combined with our knowledge of hospitality operations it allows us to pin-point and quantify wastage and opportunity. Mario’s ability to bring numbers to life is a vital part of ensuring we can deliver the best returns and savings for our clients.
Will Gordon
Martin is a people expert and has applied this passion to energy management for last 10 years. With a background in running restaurants and regional operating teams, he knows how to educate, develop and motivate teams. In applying this knowledge to energy efficiency he has been able to develop behavioural change programs that have had a long lasting impact on reducing energy consumption.A Fellow of the Energy Managers Association and a winner of Best Awareness Campaign, Green Awards for his work across c.1,000 pubs and restaurants, Martin can put energy efficiency at the heart of operational excellence.
Heather Caddick
Heather is our Business Support Administrator and manages our daily business functions and keeps us all operating as efficiently as possible. Having spent over ten years working in restaurants, mostly as an assistant manager, she has a passion for hospitality and a thorough understand of business operations. In addition to this, Heather has worked in a variety of other sectors and has also run her own business, all of this means that she has a great deal of experience in helping to drive business growth, optimize our processes and build excellent relationships with clients and partners.
Dan has a real passion for sustainability and the natural environment which led to him achieving a MSc in Environmental Science at University, taking a particular interest climate science, policy and governance. Following this he has gained a variety of experience in both consultancy and corporate roles with responsibility covering sustainability, ecology and planning. He’s also a practitioner member of IEMA.
Dan knows the hospitality sector well, having spent over 6 years working in cocktail bars, pubs, hotels and restaurants. He understands the specific practices and challenges that go with delivering a quality customer experience. As our Sustainability Manager he’ll be utiltising his knowledge and skills to drive forward the sustainability agenda with our clients and the hospitality sector as a whole.
Andrew Mudie
Andrew trained as an analytical chemist and has been working in the pharma industry for 12 years. As a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry, he joins the team bringing with him a wealth of scientific experience and problem solving expertise.
As an avid student of the sciences, Andrew is keen to apply his knowledge to help the hospitality sector confront the energy crisis head on, using his data analysis skills to interpret energy usage patterns and identify opportunities for savings, and communicating these findings effectively to our clients.
His use of the scientific method to test and quantifiably measure energy savings generated from novel approaches will be invaluable for furthering the energy reduction and sustainability agenda of HESS, and expanding the range services we can offer to the industry.
Amanda Weis
Will qualified as an electrician in 1998 after carrying out his apprenticeship working in pubs and restaurants, completing maintenance works and full refurbishments. He later expanded his technical knowledge by going on to install comms and data outlets, along with fibre optic cables and AV equipment into schools, universities, and offices, throughout the UK. He then found his way back to hospitality, where he’s been involved in facilities management and electrical project management for many years, promoted to electrical manager, on-site project supervisor and also became Electrical Qualifying Supervisor. His many years on-site tinkering with electrics in the industry mean he’s the perfect man for the job.
Amanda has experience in all things hospitality, having previously worked as an Operations Manager or General Manager in restaurants, hotels, private clubs, pubs, bars, cafes and within catering facilities at large independent schools in both the USA and the UK. In these roles she has often been responsible for the commercial and financial management and revenue growth of the business.
As well as delivering day to day services, Amanda has planned and delivered multiple hospitality events across many different locations, worked as a chef and kitchen manager and as an estate manager for properties and gardens. With this breath of experience in both front and back of house, part of the value Amanda brings is her understanding of the financial and operational environments in which HESS customers operate.