5 minutes with Richard Sager, NIO Cocktails

What would you be doing if you weren’t in the food industry?
My dream was to be a commercial pilot… but if you’re asking me for right now at my age, it would be something involved in the health and fitness sector.

What was your first job?
When I was 15, I washed cars at the local Honda dealership; that quickly led to delivering new cars a couple of years later, which at the time was a brilliant job.

What inspires you?
Anyone with a can do attitude, no matter the circumstances.

What’s the worst job you’ve done?
Washing cars at the local Honda dealership on a hot day. I had to wear overalls and be in an enclosed space – basically the most humid conditions you could imagine!

What’s your favourite part of the job?
Literally every day we do something new and move the brand and proposition forward by listening to our patrons; they are such a brilliant source of information and ideas.

And your least favourite? Everything and anything related to invoices.

How about the food industry? There’s so much rapid innovation of product and proposition that is brilliantly aligned to changing lifestyles and habits. It’s fun to watch the evolution.

Tea or coffee? Coffee.

What would be your last supper? That’s the most morbid question I’ve ever been asked in an interview… but you’ve asked. Chicken soup, medium-rare Tomahawk steak with mashed potatoes and peas, chocolate fondant for desert. Penicillin cocktail beforehand, red wine during and peated Scotch after.

What’s your motto? If it were easy, everyone would do it. Put another way, just because it’s hard isn’t a reason to not do something!

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever eaten? Cottage cheese – it’s just wrong.

What’s your favourite book? Fermat’s Last Theorem by Simon Singh. At its heart, it’s a love story of maths.

Sweet or savoury? Sweet, right up to the point that I’ve had too much and then need savoury to counteract…