Urbanspace is the leading operator of food and outdoor marketplaces in the US and UK. We cultivate authentic customer experiences by building and supporting communities of local entrepreneurs and small businesses. Urbanspace has 10 active permanent and outdoor NYC projects, including Urbanspace Vanderbilt, 570 Lex, Times Square, MadSqEats, and Broadway Bites featuring best-in-class local F&B vendors.

Founded in 1972 as Urban Space Management by Eric Reynolds, the company is responsible for some of the top mixed-use visitor destinations in London including Camden Lock, Spitalfields, and many others

US operations established in 1993 by President Eldon Scott who re-invigorated vendor-based marketplaces and foodhalls in New York City.

Senior Director, Operations

Location: New York, NY

As Urbanspace continues to grow both here in New York and in other cites we are looking for a passionate, hospitality-focused Operations leader to grow and enhance our foodhall operational excellence. This high-level, strategic position will report directly to the CEO and lead all aspects of foodhall operations (i.e., finance, legal, marketing, retail, restaurants, and foodhall ops IT). S/he will be responsible for budget administration, cost reduction strategy & procedures, training, developing and implementing operating policies and procedures. Position requires a minimum of 10-15 years’ experience in restaurant and foodservice operations, bonus if from operators with a rigorous eye towards customer service and hospitality.

This person will …

• Be accountable for design and deployment of superior operations and management of Urbanspace foodhalls, including but not limited to: staff hiring, training, and performance evaluation, enterprise technology, inventory management, maintenance projects, compliance (legal / health dept compliance) and overall budgetary allocation to G&A and labor costs

• Lead, manage, and evaluate foodhall teams to ensure superior hospitality for customers, organizational alignment and execution of strategy
• Direct and manage overall operations team strategy & activity along defined KPIs
• Foster strong team culture focused on delivering superior customer experiences
• Design and roll out robust training programs
• Acts as team leader for operations, and other cross-functional departments (marketing, etc.) on site priorities to enable the organization to succeed in achieving asset targets
• Assist in new openings as required to ensure successful implementation of SOPs
   

• Responsible, along with the rest of Urbanspace leadership team, for holding a strategic view of the foodhall experience. They will define, develop, and delivery long-term strategic direction of each site, taking a 360 view of the ways to improve operations at each location, including, directing throught leadership on technology, training, and vendor management
• Act as “owner” of onsite operations at foodhalls, and assist in special projects / activities as required, including but not limited to:
• Providing input during Real Estate development / design processes for items impacting Capex and environmental changes to assets
• Driving forward special or strategic projects impacting foodhalls (e.g., technology and special expansion initiatives)
• Continuously improving processes/tools/”ways of working”

Ideally, the candidate will have…

• Have at least 10-15 years of work experience and leadership at a reputable hospitality or food-service concept; national experience strongly preferred
• Are a proven leader and team player, and able to lead teams and align multiple stakeholders to a single vision
• Have a high level of comfort with enterprise technology relating to food / hospitality (e.g., POS systems, ERPs, etc.)
• Are highly motivated and excited to roll up your sleeves and be part of a rapidly growing organization and build processes and procedures from the ground up
• Are not afraid of new and disruptive business models, able to take learnings from traditional industry expertise and think outside of the box to incorporate new ways of evaluating and structuring real estate / F&B businesses
• Are a self-starter, unafraid of unstructured environments and ready to hit the ground running
• Have excellent analytical & organizational skills, and proven ability to focus and successfully execute projects to completion
• Have a finger on the pulse for consumer trends