Greene King, which runs about 2,500 pubs, restaurants and hotels, has named chief digital and commercial officer Clair Preston-Beer as its next chief executive. She succeeds Nick Mackenzie, who steps down at the end of February 2027 after nearly eight years in the role, and becomes the first woman to lead the group in its 227-year history.
Preston-Beer takes over in March 2027. She joined Greene King in 2020 as managing director of pubs, and earlier worked at Whitbread, where she helped scale the Costa Coffee brand in the UK and overseas before its sale to The Coca-Cola Company in 2019. Mackenzie, who will stay on the board during the handover, said it had been “the privilege of my career” to lead the group.
What Greene King said about the handover
Mackenzie described Preston-Beer as “an exceptionally qualified successor” and said he had worked closely with her for the last six years. Preston-Beer said the group has an “ambitious strategy in place that is focused on growing share in a challenging environment”. She added that Greene King has prioritised investment in data and AI so that each pub is easier for its teams to run.
Mackenzie said he was “delighted” that Preston-Beer would be taking the reins, and that he knew she shares his passion for the industry. He will remain on the board to help with the transition next year, while she takes up the role from March.
The estate she inherits
PA describes Greene King as Britain’s second biggest pub chain, with about 38,000 workers. Mackenzie led it through its takeover by the Hong Kong group CK Assets in 2019 and has since overseen an overhaul of its pubs and brewery operations. In March the group said it was moving about 300 managed pubs into a new division, with around half earmarked for sale, disposals that would move sites to other operators rather than to franchisees, unlike the brands in the UK franchise directory.
In May it agreed to sell Old Speckled Hen to the owner of Estrella Damm, a deal that will in the long term close the Westgate Brewery in Bury St Edmunds, where Greene King is building a new site.
Where franchising sits in the group
Greene King is one of the six pub companies regulated by the Pubs Code in England and Wales, which covers businesses with 500 or more tied pubs. Most of its pub partner agreements are tenancies and leases, which are not franchises, three routes compared in our guide to opening a pub in the UK.
Its pub partner pages list one genuine franchise offer, under the Hive Pubs brand, and Greene King uses the word franchise only for that. The announcement, as reported by PA and The Morning Advertiser, does not mention Hive, the partner offer or any change to the pub estate beyond the sales already announced in March and May.
Good to know: tenancy is not franchising
A Greene King tenancy or lease is a property agreement. The UK has no statutory definition of a franchise, so the only test is what a company says about its own offer. Greene King applies the word to Hive Pubs and to nothing else.
