Lorraine Heskin of Gourmet Food Parlour Wins CEO of the Year

Lorraine Heskin of Gourmet Food Parlour picked up the medium business CEO of the year title. Lorraine Heskin is Founder and CEO of Gourmet Food Parlour and award-winning entrepreneur.

Lorraine is the definition of ambitious, she is tenacious, resilient, and not afraid of hard work. Hailing from a Barna in Co. Galway, she studied at the University of Limerick before heading off to New York for three years, working in a diverse range of food businesses. On returning to Dublin, she opened the first restaurant in Dun Laoghaire in 2006.

Since then, Gourmet Food Parlour has grown into a very successful business employing over 300 people across its numerous locations and offerings. Lorraine has restaurants across Ireland, including one in Salthill, Galway.

Over 400 leaders gathered in Dublin this month for the presentation of the inaugural Business Post Leadership Excellence Awards. The event, which recognised C-suite achievers across Irish businesses, was held in partnership with Grant Thornton. A total of fourteen awards were presented across a range of categories including CEO of the year (large business), CEO of the year (small to medium business), chief marketing officer of the year, ESG leader of the year, and chief financial officer of the year. The awards were judged by a mix of industry experts and Business Post journalists and attracted a wide variety of entries from across Irish business.

Gourmet Food Parlour opened its first cafeì in Dun Laoghaire 18 years ago with the inspiration to serve a range of quality, artisan dishes, using simple locally sourced ingredients whilst serving it all in a fun relaxed way. The group has grown to ten locations across Dublin, Galway and Meath as well as a large catering and events business. Gourmet Food Parlour is the largest sports catering company in Ireland. Organisations that put their trust in GFP include the FAI, Irish Boxing and, the Olympic Federation of Ireland.

GFP is also the official nutritional partners with Dublin GAA County Board and Shamrock Rovers, catering for each player’s individual dietary needs and enabling them to perform at their optimum level throughout the season.Gourmet Food Parlour’s hugely successful catering division is also associated with several large corporations, providing catering to industry giants such as AIG, Google, Zoetis, Salesforce & The Special Olympics.