Introducing our official Imbibe Live ambassadors for our 2024 event.
We’re honoured to have some of the most respected and influential industry leaders involved in curating this year’s masterclass programme.
Follow them on social, get to know them and look out for updates on what we’ve got coming up at the event.
Jack Sotti is an award winning bartender, entrepreneur and passionate booze communicator, born and raised in London.
Jack cut his teeth owning and operating award winning venues in Melbourne, London, Auckland such as Boilermaker House and Eau de Vie Melbourne. In a quest to understand global cocktail culture Jack took a year-long pilgrimage around the world in 80 bars. After being crowned World Class Bartender of the Year Australia and placing third globally with the world’s first levitating cocktail, Jack went to work for Diageo, first as Tanqueray Brand Ambassador and later as Head of Brand Advocacy of the UK.
Currently Jack is a cocktail presenter on Channel 4's Sunday Brunch, Founder of KombuchaWarehouse.com and partner at Renais Spirits whilst consulting on numerous projects.
Laura Willoughby MBE is the founder of the world’s largest mindful drinking movement, Club Soda, and the UK’s foremost expert in low and no alcoholic drinks. Club Soda runs the new Low & No Tasting Rooms in Covent Garden.
Receiving an MBE for services to the community in 2004, Laura’s devotion to Club Soda means hundreds of thousands of people are supported in their journeys to live well by being more mindful about drinking alcohol.
Laura was voted one of 2022’s 100 most influential women in hospitality by CODE, named as one of Drinks Retailing’s latest Top 100 Most Influential People in Drink and is a Trustee for The Drinks Trust.
Lorraine is a multi-award-winning social entrepreneur, hospitality consultant and life coach. Having spent two decades as an executive director for brands including Gordon Ramsay Restaurants and Corbin & King, Lorraine felt compelled to form Be Inclusive Hospitality CIC in 2020, due to the consistent lack of representation of people of colour in positions of influence, and the supply chain. This social enterprise now holds the prime position of igniting the much-needed conversations, and delivering initiatives to advance change within hospitality, food, and drink sectors.
Her work has been featured in the Evening Standard, Metro, The Guardian, The Caterer and Big Hospitality. Lorraine is a judge for Guild of Fine Foods Great Taste Awards, Bold Woman Awards UK, by Veuve Clicquot, Uber Eats Restaurant Awards, Purple Umbrella Awards and the British Guild of Beer Writers Awards.
In 2022 Lorraine was named the GQ Food & Drink Innovator of the year winner, she received a special award in the Code Hospitality 100 Most Influential Women in Hospitality list and won Entrepreneur of the Year at the Precious Awards. In 2023 Lorraine was named NatWest and Pioneers Post WISE100: Top women in social enterprise. Be Inclusive Hospitality was recognised by NatWest’s SE100 last year, as one of the UK’s most impressive social enterprises.
Award-winning writer Melissa Cole is widely acknowledged as one of the UK’s leading beer & food experts. Respected the world over for her fine palate, Melissa is invited to judge at competitions in New Zealand, the US and Brazil, as well as closer to home in the UK and across Europe. Melissa is also a regular contributor to several different broadsheets, food and drink magazines, BBC and independent radio and television - as well as international appearances all over the world. She was also the first women to be given a Knighthood of Mash Brewer's Mash Staff by the Union of Belgian Brewers.
As the first woman beer writer in the UK, Melissa has had to overcome some sizeable hurdles, and spent years reading, studying and educating herself about how to properly assess beer, partly through achieving her Certified Cicerone© but also about the brewing process, by getting her hands dirty making collaboration beers with breweries across the globe, like Fuller's, Odell, St Austell, Thornbridge, Rooster's, Ilkley, Anspach & Hobday, New Holland and Brasserie de la Senne to name but a few.
Melissa’s other passion is food and is recognised as the UK’s leading expert in pairing, and cooking with, beer having dedicated years to figuring out which beers work in which dishes and why (which she regularly calls ‘making a whole series of disgusting mistakes, so you don’t have to’).
The Movers & Shakers theatre will feature fun competitions and panel discussions to showcase a rounded view of what the industry is all about. Join in with both fast-paced drinks challenges and panel discussions with key hospitality leaders sharing insights and advice that you can bring back to your business.
The Tasting Room is just as it sounds - the place to be if you want to refine your palate and improve your knowledge of key and growing categories. This theatre is dedicated entirely to flight tastings hosted by experts who will guide you through unique flavours in different categories.
Want to add some pizazz to your cocktail list? Visit The Cocktail Lounge, Imbibe Live’s very own action-packed mixology lab, for a dynamic line-up of talks and interactive masterclasses presented by the on-trade’s finest.
If you source, buy or serve drinks within the drinks industry, Imbibe Live is the must-attend show for you.
Be part of the UK's most talked about event in the on-trade and meet with the industry's finest.