From Cabin Crew to F&B Managing Director

Episode Summary

Ahmed Azmi, now MD of Sophia Café, rose from Etihad cabin crew to Chili’s waiter and, via Chili’s “school” and the three F’s (friendly, firm, fair), became area manager of 17 sites. He later helped launch 12 Cheeky outlets in three months and defends brand consistency ruthlessly (even replacing a franchisee’s fryer). At Sophia he slashed a 52% COGS by installing POS/inventory control, shifting to suppliers, and attacking W.E.P.T. (wastage, errors, portioning, theft), enabling expansion into hospitals and new brands. His playbook: hire for attitude, pay for trials, keep emotion out of HR, read the numbers, and stay loyal to the brand.

Learnings From The Episode

From Etihad Cabin Crew to Building One of Dubai’s Fastest-Growing Coffee Groups: The Rise of Ahmad Azmi

Some hospitality leaders take the traditional route — culinary school, internship, junior FOH, steady rise through the ranks.

Ahmad Azmi didn’t.

Today he’s the Managing Director of Sophia Café and the driving force behind one of Dubai’s most ambitious specialty coffee groups. But his path began in a place that surprises most people:
Etihad Airways, as cabin crew.

He loved travel — but not the rigid, robotic schedule. What he loved was people, service, pressure, constant interaction. So he walked away from the airline world and stepped down the ladder to start again as a waiter at Chili’s.

Five months later, he was running branches.
A few years later, he was area manager for 17 Chili’s locations across Abu Dhabi.

That was the beginning.

Chili’s: The “School of Ops” That Built His Leadership Playbook

Ahmad credits Chili’s with shaping his management style more than anything else in his career.

Chili’s wasn’t just a job — it was an operating system.
He memorised the brand’s famous “six boxes,” studied the manuals every night, and internalised the three F’s that still guide how he leads today:

Friendly. Firm. Fair.

He used them with staff.
With suppliers.
With franchisees.
And even in his personal life.

It’s also where he learned to:

• run shift meetings that actually matter
• speak confidently with guests
• evaluate staff calmly
• manage high-volume operations without modern tech
• forecast without tools (and what happens when you get it wrong…)

His most painful lesson? A 100k AED ordering mistake caused by misreading demand and over-ordering US-imported ingredients with a three-week lead time.

“It cost us 100k — but it taught me how to read numbers properly. I wish I’d learned that earlier.”

Opening 12 Locations in 3 Months — and the Fryer Story Everyone Remembers

After Chili’s, Ahmad joined a startup group tasked with franchising trendy brands from Global Village across the UAE.

One brand, Cheeky, had already sold 12 franchise contracts — all opening within 90 days.

Ahmad’s method?

A master checklist.
Copy → paste → execute.

But the real challenge wasn’t the speed — it was enforcing consistency.

One franchisee decided to buy a different fryer: a higher-end model, 100k AED instead of the required 70k.
Great tech — wrong output.

Ahmad visited him, explained why it mattered, negotiated politely… and when the franchisee still wouldn’t budge, he invoked the final “F”: firm.

He drove to the branch the next day with the correct fryer, installed it himself, and delivered the 100k model to the franchisee’s villa.

Because consistency is the brand.
One variation becomes ten. Ten becomes a reputation.

He’s seen big brands lose entire regions because they allowed one franchise group to drift. He refuses to let that happen.

Sophia Café: Fixing a 52% Cost of Goods and Turning a Coffee Kiosk Into a Group

When Ahmad joined Sophia Café, it wasn’t the glossy hospital-inside specialty concept people know today.

It was a handful of kiosks with:

• No inventory system
• No recipe costing
• WhatsApp supplier orders
• Supermarket sourcing
• Overstocking
• Theft
• A POS from the stone age
• A shocking 52% COGS

“Is this a coffee shop or a fine-dining restaurant?” he remembers asking.

He applied the Chilis methodology again — especially a framework he still swears by:

W.E.P.T. → Wastage, Errors, Portioning, Theft

Fix those four, he says, and any cost problem becomes solvable.

Together with the founder he:

• upgraded the POS
• implemented inventory and supplier controls
• rebuilt the order cycle
• shifted to proper suppliers
• created SOPs
• hired for attitude, fired for fit
• enforced loyalty to standards
• and layered in Supy to formalise everything they controlled manually

Within months, COGS collapsed to a healthy level — and suddenly the business had profit to reinvest, not losses to cover.

Today Sophia has:

• multiple hospital cafés
• a full kitchen concept
• new brands (More Brew, Entourage Burger, specialty Wagyū burger, an Indian concept, a chicken brand)
• expansion plans to 20+ brands in 3 years
• and a dedicated “Sophia expansion fund” built from internal profits

No outside capital needed.

The People Philosophy: Hire for Attitude, Pay for Trials, No Emotion in HR

If you ask Ahmad what separates good operators from great ones, his answer is always the same:

“Attitude first. Skill later.”

He personally approves every hire, even with HR and training teams in place.

• Every candidate does a paid trial shift
• He evaluates how they handle pace, pressure, and guests
• He trains people himself
• He avoids emotional hiring and emotional firing
• And he stays close to frontline staff — every week, without fail

“If your team has problems at home, it will affect your business. We’re humans. So I have to know them — personally.”

What He Wishes Every First-Time Operator Knew

Ahmad doesn’t hesitate on this question:

“Learn to read numbers. Early.”

Not just P&L lines — but forecasting, order cycles, seasonality, per-item margins, waste behaviour.

He learned by making expensive mistakes.
He wants young operators to learn before they make them.

His Views on Dubai’s Future & Why Sophia Is Expanding So Fast

Dubai’s rapid upgrade of hospitals, neighbourhoods, and lifestyle developments has created an unusual opportunity:

high-end F&B inside non-traditional spaces.

Hospitals now feel like hotels.
Coffee concepts need to match that standard.

Sophia’s vision aligns perfectly — aesthetic interiors, specialty coffee, full kitchens, and a hospitality experience strong enough to stand alone, regardless of location.

That alignment between:

• Dubai’s vision
• the founder’s ambition
• and Ahmad’s operational discipline

…is the engine now driving Sophia’s growth.

His Final Advice to Anyone Running a Hospitality Brand

Ahmad ends with two principles he lives by:

1. Be loyal to the brand — and it will be loyal to you.

No shortcuts. No inconsistencies. No exceptions.

2. Have courage + knowledge = you can do anything.

“Nothing is complicated when you have both.”

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