Cafe Kitchen Manager
Job description
Original text imported from Reed
About the role
We have an exciting opportunity for a Kitchen Manager with hospitality experience to join one of our lively café kitchens. You’ll oversee the daily operations of your kitchen, as well as selecting, training and developing kitchen colleagues to deliver delicious food that keeps our customers happy, satisfied, and coming back for more. It’s all part of making every day a little better for them, and us.
As a Kitchen Manager, you’ll be responsible for stock levels, food storage and preparation, as well as the highest levels of food safety and hygiene. You’ll bring your experience of working in a similarly busy environment to Tesco, where you’ll become a café menu expert keen to share your knowledge with the team around you. From health and safety to limiting food waste, you’ll understand the importance of every detail and inspire your team to deliver outstanding food quality and speed of service - after all, no one tries harder for customers than us.
Tesco Cafés are a place to get on. We believe in creating a great environment for colleagues to work – and providing opportunities for everyone to be at their best. With your previous experience at supervisory level or above, you’ll demonstrate great leadership and people management skills as you build an inclusive place where people feel respected, safe and valued. In doing so, you’ll grow as a leader and develop your skills and experience as part of our friendly team.
Please note that you need to be 18 or over to apply for this role.
What is in it for you
Alongside a fantastic work life balance, we offer excellent benefits that help make The Cafe a great place to work. These include but aren’t limited to::
- Get 10% off and 15% at pay day weekends; save up to £2,000 a year with your Colleague Clubcard with an additional card to share with family outside your home.
- Request flexible working from day one
- Retirement savings plan
- Life Assurance
- Access to free wellbeing services with a range of resources to support your mind, body, and life
- An exclusive deals and discounts website saving you money on everyday purchases, treats for the family, eating out and utility bills for the home
- Uniform provided and policies to support you for all of life’s moments, big and small
- Holiday starting at 28 days (Including Bank Holidays)
- Access to our colleague networks providing a space for colleagues to come together from a range of backgrounds. For more information about our colleague networks please click here.
You will be responsible for
Whilst specific responsibilities will be dependent upon the changing needs of Tesco as a business, the following provides an overview of the role’s key responsibilities and measures:
- Managing food stocks, ordering, storage and preparation in line with food safety and hygiene regulations.
- Having overall responsibility of the kitchen, including routines, processes, change implementation and gross profit.
- Selecting, training and developing back of house colleagues to deliver timely, tasty food to customers.
- Identifying new and better ways of working to keep improving services for customers and colleagues.
- Ensuring that all training, health and safety and food safety requirements are met.
- Understanding the key drivers of our service plan and delivering to the standard required.
- Stepping up to oversee the full café operation in the absence of the Café Manager.
You will need
Whilst specific responsibilities will be dependent upon the changing needs of Tesco as a business, the following provides an overview of the role’s key responsibilities and measures:
- A background in hospitality, at supervisory level and above.
- People management skills that allow you to lead by example and coach in an inclusive manner.
- Experience of remaining productive in a high-pressure environment.
- A commitment to excellent customer service.
- A desire to create an inclusive work environment where colleagues feel respected, safe and valued.
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Personal
- Good planning and organisation skills.
- Confidence using your initiative to identify opportunities to improve our ways of working or adapt to different situations.
- Excellent communication skills to motivate and support a growing team and work closely with the Café Manager.
About us
With 329 cafés across the country and counting, our teams work closely to make sure that the customer experience is to the best standard and service; no two days are ever the same! Tesco Cafés are a great place to work, with a genuine family feel - truly a place to get on.
We are proud to have an inclusive culture at Tesco Café where everyone is welcome and truly feels able to be themselves. In our cafés, we not only celebrate diversity, but we strive to create a workforce that reflects our customers not only here in the UK, but worldwide. Our aim is to attract and welcome a diverse range of applicants from all walks of life, offering many varying working patterns across our business and we would love to hear from you.
We know life looks a little different for each of us. That’s why at Tesco, we always welcome chats about flexible working. Some people are at the start of their careers, some want the freedom to do the things they love. Others are going through life-changing moments like becoming a carer, nearing retirement, adapting to parenthood, or something else. So, talk to us throughout your application about how we can support.
We’re proud to have been accredited as a Disability Confident Leader and we’re committed to providing a fully inclusive and accessible recruitment process. For further information on the accessibility support we can offer, please click here.
On occasions where we have high volumes of applicants, some roles may close earlier than the advertised end date in order for us to manage all of the applicants appropriately. We will only be able to offer individual feedback to those candidates who attend an interview.
Key skills
AI-extracted from the job advert
Application advice
5 AI-generated recommendations to maximise your chances.
⭐ Lead your CV with a Personal Statement that explicitly names 'Kitchen Manager' and 'food safety compliance', as these are the two most repeated requirements in the advert.
📊 Quantify your kitchen experience: e.g. 'Managed stock ordering for a 120-cover café, reducing food waste by 22% over 6 months'.
🎯 Highlight any supervisory or team-leader experience prominently — the advert states 'previous experience at supervisory level or above' as a clear prerequisite.
🌐 Mention specific food hygiene qualifications (e.g. Level 2 or Level 3 Food Hygiene Award) as the advert stresses food safety and hygiene regulations throughout.
🤝 Include a bullet on colleague development or training — the advert explicitly calls out 'selecting, training and developing back of house' as a core responsibility.
Suggested CV bullets
3 bullets our AI drafted for this specific advert, mirroring its ATS keywords.
Add these 3 bullets under your most recent experience:
- •Managed daily stock ordering and food storage for a 90-cover café kitchen, cutting food waste by 18% over 8 months through improved rotation and ordering schedules.
- •Trained and developed a back-of-house team of 6, delivering structured inductions and on-shift coaching that reduced food safety incidents to zero across a 12-month period.
- •Oversaw gross profit tracking and kitchen cost controls across a high-volume café, maintaining food cost percentage within a 28% target for 3 consecutive quarters.
Free to copy — tailoring requires a 30-sec CV upload.
Your cover letter is ready
We've drafted a cover letter for Tesco. Preview the opening, then unlock the full personalised version.
Letter preview — tailored to Tesco
Dear Hiring Manager,
Tesco's café kitchen operation demands precisely the skills I have spent the last four years building — food safety compliance, stock management, and developing back-of-house teams to deliver consistent food quality at pace. The Café Kitchen Manager role at the Newmarket store is a strong match for my background in busy hospitality kitchens, and I am keen to bring that experience to Tesco.
My background in kitchen supervision includes managing daily stock ordering and storage for a 90-cover café, maintaining Level 3 Food Hygiene standards, and reducing food waste by 18% through tighter ordering routines. I have trained and developed junior kitchen colleagues, running inductions and on-the-job coaching that improved service speed and reduced errors during peak periods.
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Interview questions
10 questions generated from this advert.
Technical
- ›How do you ensure full compliance with food safety and hygiene regulations during a busy service period?
- ›Walk us through your approach to stock management, ordering, and minimising food waste.
- ›How do you monitor and manage gross profit within a café kitchen environment?
- ›Describe the food storage procedures you have implemented in a previous role to meet HACCP standards.
- ›How do you plan and manage kitchen routines and processes when implementing menu or operational changes?
Behavioural
- ›Tell me about a time you identified a food safety risk in your kitchen and how you resolved it.
- ›Describe a situation where you had to train and develop a team member who was underperforming.
- ›Give an example of how you have built an inclusive and respectful team environment in a previous role.
- ›Tell me about a time you managed high-pressure service while maintaining food quality and speed.
- ›Describe a time you successfully reduced food waste or improved stock efficiency in a kitchen setting.
STAR answer examples
Model answers using the Situation-Task-Action-Result framework. Adapt to your own experience.
Tell me about a time you identified a food safety risk in your kitchen and how you resolved it.
Describe a situation where you had to train and develop a team member who was underperforming.