Be Inclusive Hospitality, founded by award-winning Birmingham-born hospitality veteran Lorraine Copes to launch in Birmingham on Monday 24th April at the Grand Hotel.
The not-for-profit and social enterprise with a mission to accelerate race equity within hospitality, food, and drink launched in June 2020 conducting annual research and delivering a broad array of initiatives to advance change.
Since inception Be Inclusive Hospitality has supported over 2,000 employees and 50 founders with mentorship, scholarships, and grand funding. The social enterprise works has a growing corporate membership community, and has delivered educational workshops for over 900 hospitality leaders on topics including culture, race equity and fostering inclusion.
The launch will be marked with an event on the 24th April at The Grand Hotel, and will include a panel discussion, scholarship launch, and networking opportunities. This event hopes to create space for Black, Asian and ethnic minority hospitality people in Birmingham to build new networks, whilst providing the opportunity for attendees to join the community and apply for scholarships available for Birmingham based employees and founders.
The panel discussion will include multi award-winning Michelin starred chef Aktar Islam; Chef, Culinary Director of the Grand Hotel Adam Bateman, Managing Director of 2 Much Passion CIC Vanessa Kelly and Award-winning Wine Director of the Wilderness Restaurant Sonal Clare.
The panel will be followed by a reading from award winning poet Casey Bailey.
Be Inclusive Hospitality was founded by Lorraine Copes due to her own lived experience of lack of representation of Black, Asian and ethnic minorities within positions of influence or the supply chain, and felt compelled to take action to drive change.
The community today is formed of 450 members, 50 partners, 90 ambassadors and 95 mentors, with virtual initiatives only to-date being accessible outside of London.
“I am so very happy to be launching Be Inclusive Hospitality within my home town of Birmingham. As we approach our third year of trade, my goal is to ensure that we deliver an increased social impact up and down the country, and an important way to do this is to have a physical presence in cities outside of London.”
Be Inclusive Hospitality are on the lookout for Birmingham based Ambassadors who can help to champion their work within the midlands, and details on how to apply will be made available on the night.
Tickets can be purchased here: https://bihospitality.co.uk/events/