Andrea Calistri
From running restaurants to leading food companies: twenty years with responsibility for the P&L.
Today he brings that experience to restaurants, chains and food companies that need to grow, get organized or recover margin.
Twenty years inside food retail and food manufacturing
Andrea Calistri has worked in food retail and food manufacturing since 2007. The first six years are network operations: Restaurant Manager at Fratelli La Bufala across Milan, Rome and Brussels, then Operations Director at Grill Inn Group, then head of the foodservice division at Riso Gallo, where he launched the Chicchiricchi single-brand chain with the pilot restaurant and the national and international franchising project.
In October 2013 he became Managing Director of the Italian subsidiary of KellyDeli, a family-owned international group present in more than nine countries: a subsidiary to be built from scratch inside modern trade retailers, with full responsibility for P&L, market entry strategy, sales, operations and franchise network development. In three years the network went from zero to ninety-five corners and revenue from zero to 65 million euro, with a market share of up to 30% according to Nielsen. It is the lesson that still opens almost every engagement: a format that works across three units is a different thing from a format that holds at ninety, and the difference lies in how much of that format is written down, measured and teachable to people who were not there when it was created.
From November 2015 to December 2019 he ran Calistri & Partners, a strategy and operations boutique for organized foodservice and food manufacturing: Old Wild West on the franchise network, Doppio Malto on proof of concept, procurement and logistics, Fiorital on the first sushi corner in Milan, Madeo Salumi & Savigni on the corner at FICO Bologna, UCI Cinemas on the UCI Luxe and Backstage bistro formats. In parallel, between 2017 and 2019, he was investor and Managing Director of Dante’s La Toscana del Gusto. These are the years that clarify the limit of consulting seen from the outside: a process fault takes two days to identify, changing it requires the people who run it every day to recognize it, and that part is not delivered in a document.
The engagement on the commercial direction of EatHappy’s Italian branch, started in 2019 as an advisor, converted into his appointment as Managing Director. From January 2020 to March 2024 he was CEO Italy of the group — founder-owned, headquartered in Germany — with responsibility extended to France and the Netherlands from 2022, and at the same time Managing Director of Wakame Italia, the group’s manufacturing company, whose Bologna plant grew from seven hundred to four thousand square metres. Direct reporting line to the international board. In 2024 the group entered the Financial Times FT 1000 ranking of Europe’s fastest-growing companies. Running the same brand in three countries teaches something counter-intuitive: the same P&L reads differently in Milan, Amsterdam and Paris, because labour cost, network density and channel conditions move the break-even point.
What he brings to food companies
From this path comes a know-how that holds together the three planes that in food companies almost always stay separate: the number, the format and the people who execute it. Opening and growing a network, from the first unit to scale. Reading the P&L of a network and of a single unit down to the break-even point, by channel and by product line. Making a format replicable, with standards and controls that can be taught. Building the organization that supports growth. Governing the relationship between plant, procurement, assortment and service to the network. Taking a product to its channels — modern trade, traditional trade, corners and direct networks — in Italy and across Europe.
What reaches the client is the standpoint of someone who has already carried full responsibility for the result. Recommendations come with the number that supports them, the assumptions stated one by one and the worst case already calculated, and they come with an awareness of what happens on Monday morning, when the decision has to be executed by a team. Since 2024 this work runs through AC Retail Advisory, the firm that works alongside owners and senior leadership of food manufacturing companies and of foodservice and retail networks, and the venture capital and private equity funds investing in the sector.
Let’s talk
If you are facing a phase of growth, transformation or reorganization, let’s talk.
