Pret A Manger has put a proper heavyweight in charge of its brand.

On 29 September 2025, the London-based coffee and food-to-go chain announced that Matthew Bresnahan has joined as Chief Marketing Officer to help “drive forward the company’s growth plans and bring the brand to more people.”

It’s the first time Pret has had a marketer in the C-suite since it scrapped the chief customer and growth officer role in 2022, effectively reviving the CMO title as it steps up expansion in the UK, US and new markets such as South Africa.

In his new role, Bresnahan will lead global and localised marketing strategy and oversee product innovation, loyalty programmes, customer insights, PR and delivery channels.

He joins from Restaurant Brands International (RBI) – parent company of Burger King and Tim Hortons – where he spent around 12 years in senior international marketing roles, including VP-level positions across virtual brands, global guest insights, analytics, digital marketing and brand management.

So Pret is getting someone who has seen a lot of high-volume, habit-driven behaviour up close.

The interesting bit is where this role sits. Bresnahan isn’t just being handed campaigns and comms – he’s also responsible for the levers that shape how often people show up and how much they spend: menu innovation, price–value storytelling, subscription-style propositions, digital ordering and the app layer.

Pret is in that tricky space where it has become a bit of a comfort brand in its home market, while simultaneously trying to feel fresh and exciting in newer cities and channels. Marrying those two realities is not a simple media brief; it’s a question of whether the entire experience hangs together – the coffee, the food, the queues, the app, the offers, the “little Pret rituals” people build into their day.

Bresnahan’s RBI background is useful here. Burger King and Tim Hortons live and die on frequency, value perception and local nuance: the promo calendar, bundle architecture, day-parting, even how you talk about price without feeling cheap. Bringing that mindset into Pret could mean:

• sharper, more consistent value messaging (especially in a cost-of-living context)
• more structured experimentation with subscriptions, bundles and occasion-based offers
• a stronger bridge between insight, menu development and everyday comms

If Pret uses this CMO reset well, you’d expect less “random acts of marketing” and more of a joined-up system where menu, pricing, promos and brand all feel like they’re pulling in the same direction – especially for those office workers and commuters who are effectively on auto-pilot when they choose their morning coffee and lunch.