Managing Director of foodpanda, Emma Heap, has created a platform for women from F&B to collaborate on the progression of the industry. She has also been gathering their stories, journeys, business challenges and advice for other women starting their careers.
“Over the past few months we have been building a community of female leaders within the F&B space in Singapore. Interestingly, it is no longer about women competing in the space – with men or other women. It’s about a strong feeling of collaboration to help one another progress in our industry and discuss trends, issues and how we can all make a difference.”
– Emma Heap, MD, foodpanda Singapore
Singapore, March 8th 2016 – From the kitchens to the boardrooms, women have grown to shape the food and beverage industry to what it is today. To commemorate this year’s International Women’s Day, foodpanda celebrates powerful and influential women behind some of the most popular F&B establishments and restaurants in Singapore. foodpanda’s Managing Director Emma Heap organised a platform for female leaders to share their business stories and challenges.
From L-R: Karen Chan – Chief Digital Officer, Pizza Hut, Sharon Loh – Subway, Dr Charlotte Bruce – Co-Founder, Quandoo, Emma Heap – Managing Director, foodpanda, Katherine Braha Desbaillets – Director, Salad Stop!, Zenna Ho – Eight Treasures Group, Lee Hwai Bin – Director, Yogart
“foodpanda is excited to create a platform for women to share knowledge within a traditionally male dominated industry. In addition, we are happy to support them and tell their stories to inspire the next generation of female leaders. We will be releasing stories throughout this week and then regularly for the rest of 2016,” Emma adds.
Emma has been inspired by the stories she’s heard over the past few weeks and feels that there is huge potential for women in F&B to work together to inspire the next generation of female leaders and to help to grow each other’s businesses. She has been listening to achievements as well as pain points for women in the industry from how to get more digitally savvy to promoting veganism to a mass audience.
foodpanda will be dedicating features throughout the week, including Katherine Braha-Desbaillets, Director of SaladStop!, Karen Chan, Chief Digital Officer of Pizza Hut, Hwai Bin and Hwai Chi, the twin sisters who own Yoğart, Zenna Ho, Director of Eight Treasures Group and Charlotte Bruce, VP APAC of Quandoo. Interviewees include foodpanda restaurants but also others in the F&B space such as Quandoo, who have over 60% female employees in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Inspiring stories will be featured on foodpanda’s online magazine. Women have been asked a series of questions including their biggest business challenges, entrepreneurial story and balancing life and work. They also provide advice to other women who are starting their careers: Hwai Chi advises, “Constantly watch market trends (especially in the F&B industry), and do not be afraid to adapt and be different.”
Zenna Ho’s advice is to “Be the change you wish to see in the world, and be the best version of that change.”
Karen Chan’s advice to women is “Be brave, be yourself, bring the goodness out of others by being gracious and vulnerable.” Karen has over 15 years of experience in consumer and retail marketing. Prior to joining Pizza Hut, she led APAC regional marketing efforts for Domino’s Pizza and Coca-Cola.
Katherine from Salad Stop!, a healthy salad deli, which has expanded across SEA, is a firm believer that one should “eat to live, not live to eat”, and that consumers should be aware of what goes into their bodies This encouraged her and her family to start SaladStop!, in an attempt to connect consumer choice and action with a wider environmental impact. Since its inception five years ago, SaladStop has expanded to 13 outlets across SEA.
Emma Heap leads the foodpanda Singapore team with her tenacious vision, and passion for e-commerce and technology. Since joining foodpanda, Emma and her team have invested in technology and systems to reduce the average delivery time to just 30 minutes. Under Emma’s leadership, foodpanda Singapore achieved 400% growth in 2015 and has over 500,000 active users island-wide.
