Growing up in Pittsburgh, PA, Chris Martha started working in hospitality at an early age. He developed a passion for the business at age 14, when he scaled the ranks from dishwasher, bus boy, and line cook to waiter as a high schooler. He went on to earn a business degree in Hotel Restaurant Management from Penn State University and studied abroad in Switzerland where he fell in love with food and its deeply rooted connection with family and culture. Throughout his career, he has worked in nearly all facets of the industry, from casual to fine dining, within both hotels and restaurants. With this foundational experience, Chris today also enjoys his own venture – Scout – an Atlanta restaurant just around the corner from his family’s home.

Chris’ career began with an internship with Hyatt Regency Resorts in Hilton Head, SC, which led to a permanent position at the hotel’s location in Beaver Creek, CO. Hyatt proved to be an excellent training ground, but his heart was in smaller, independent eateries. He moved to Atlanta during the tourism surge brought on by the 1996 Olympic games and spent seven years with Fifth Group Restaurants, including Atlanta favorites such as South City Kitchen, LaTavola and the Food Studio.

His extensive experience has helped Chris focus on driving operational efficiencies without compromising the overall experience and satisfaction of his guests, an attribute that serves him well. Chris is well-versed in the industry and heads Valor’s Food & Beverage company.

Matt Gray joined Valor Hospitaliy in January 2013 and was Valor's first First Food and Beverage hire. He brings a wealth of world-class resort and restaurant experience to his leadership role as the guiding force behind Valor Hospitality’s food operations. Matt oversees menu and recipe creation, pricing, procurement, kitchen design and flow, staff recruitment and training and total cost controls across all disciplines.

Matt was the Executive Chef at the world-famous Inverlochy Castle Hotel, Fort William, Scotland. Under Matt’s direction, the hotel was awarded a Michelin Star rating for nine consecutive years. Travel and Leisure rated Inverlochy as ‘Best Hotel in Europe 2006’ and was voted ‘Restaurant of the Year’ by Decanter Magazine in 2003.

Matt was later recruited in 2009 to the U.S. by world-renowned French Chef, Albert Roux, to head up Chef Roux’s first American restaurant, Chez Roux at La Torretta Lake Resort and Spa in Houston, Texas. Under Matt’s leadership and direction, Chez Roux was voted ‘Best New Restaurant’ in Houston 2009. In his spare time Matt is avid Formula One fan and has become a great lover of his Big Green Egg which he plays with at any opportunity he has come all weathers.

A highly dedicated and performance-focused professional, Alister has over 25 years of experience in the hospitality industry. Originally from Cape Town South Africa, he began his hospitality career at age 17 working at several luxury properties across Cape Town, including the Cape Grace, winner of Conde Nast’s Best Hotel in the World in 2000. He moved to the US in 2001 to work for Barnsley Gardens Resort. During his six years at the resort, Alister held a variety of roles including Assistant Food & Beverage Manager and Food & Beverage Director.

From there, he took on the role of GM at The Hotel Ivy in Minneapolis. Alister then spent 8 years as North American Sales Director for DGB Wines followed by four years as Area Manager for Republic National Distributing Company, building a wine and spirits sales team focused exclusively on Hotels, Venues and Country Clubs.

In his spare time, Alister can be found on the golf course or in the kitchen – he especially loves to host a good Braai on the weekends. He grew up playing rugby and water polo and continues to be a sports fanatic.

As Executive Chef, Jim leads and oversees food and beverage concepts across the Valor Hospitality Partners portfolio. This includes supporting new menu development, special projects, culinary team development, new hotel openings and overall culinary operations.

A tenured culinary arts professional, Jim joined Valor following a 21-year career with Darden Restaurants, serving in Corporate Executive Chef roles for concepts including Capital Grille and Olive Garden. Jim brings ample experience supporting robust culinary teams, launching restaurant concepts and curating premiere dining experiences for guests across the country. As Valor’s Corporate Executive Chef, Jim applies his industry knowledge to new and existing Valor Hospitality properties, supporting the company’s continued growth throughout the United States.

Jim holds a degree in culinary arts from Johnson & Wales University in Charleston, South Carolina. Jim's passion for culinary arts began while working in professional kitchens as a teenager, launching his career in the hospitality industry. An Atlanta native, Jim currently resides in Orlando, Florida, with his wife and daughters.

Mark completed a degree in Hospitality Management in Turkey and then found his way to the USA, beginning a 10 year career with Royal Caribbean on board several cruise ships. Throughout his career with Royal Caribbean, Mark held virtually every title within the Food & Beverage department, beginning in the lower ranks as busboy and working his way up to Dining Room Manager. Because of his extensive experience in all roles, Mark has always been a team player and a hands-on manager, stepping into any role to ensure consistency of service and complete guest satisfaction.

In addition to his career with Royal Caribbean, his 35 years of hospitality experience include full service luxury collection hotels, such as The Palace Hotel, San Francisco; The Diplomat Resort in Hollywood, Florida; and the St. Anthony in San Antonio. While in San Antonio, Mark created and spearheaded a new restaurant design concept within the city’s corporate and entertainment district.

His comprehensive experience includes, new openings and renovations, new training programs, menu planning and wine selections in collaboration with the Executive Chef, budget analysis, F&B forecasting and cost control.

Ermin joined Valor as Corporate Director of Revenue Strategy, providing leadership and strategic insight to property teams in order to maximize revenues and optimize channel distribution. His "Total Revenue Management" system is fully flexible, scalable, and tailored to each asset, regardless of size of portolio of location.

Starting his career at Hyatt Hotels, Ermin has spent the last 20 plus years in hospitality management, leading large diverse teams through challenging market conditions. He spent 10 years working for Starwood Hotels, and prior to joining Valor he served as Vice President of Revenue & E- Commerce at Phoenix American Hospitality.

His approach, centered on strategic planning, training, project management, and system engineering strategies has helped propel his career through the ranks. By identifying deficiencies and potential opportunities, and developing innovative cost effective solutions for enhancing competitiveness, he was able to not only surpass revenue generation targets, but drive record breaking increase in ADR and NOI, all while taking market share from the competitive set and surpassing RevPAR index targets.

Following an award-winning career in luxury, resorts, independent and branded hotels, Euan formed Valor Hospitality Partners in 2012 with longtime friend and business partner Steve Cesinger. Since then, Euan and his dynamic team have executed on many distressed property turnarounds, new builds and re-brandings, resulting in a highly-regarded reputation for the quality of the Valor execution both commercially and culturally.

In 2013, Euan and Steve purchased a U.K. operating platform, which today operates 36 hotels and resorts throughout Great Britain. Utilizing their unique brand of culture and results delivery, highlights of the U.K. work includes taking an IHG portfolio of underperforming U.K. hotels to the number one operated franchise portfolio in Europe and throughout the entire estate; project managing multi-million pound renovations, upgrades, rebranding; and the concepting and development of ‘High Street Retail’ themed restaurants within select Hilton Hotels. In 2013, Euan formed PMR Hospitality Partners in Cape Town, South Africa with lifelong friends, Tony Romer-Lee and Michael Pownall, creating a bespoke, unique, full-service management company targeted at filling a huge need gap in the Sub-Saharan African hospitality market. In 2018, PMR became Valor Africa & Middle East turning Valor into what is now referred to as Valor Global with new office openings in Bangkok, Thailand and Dubai.

Euan’s vision for a truly bespoke global management company sharing resources, skills, and strategic thinking, as well as internally-created operating systems, procedures and guidelines which Reimagine Hospitality has come to life with Valor Global now managing, asset managing advising, or consulting on over 80 projects around the world.

Steve Cesinger has over 40 years of experience in private equity, corporate finance, investment banking, distressed/workouts, treasury and operations, including a principal focus over the last 20 years in commercial real estate and hospitality. Since forming Valor with long-time friend and colleague Euan McGlashan, Steve has advised on client portfolio acquisitions and financings for more than twenty hotels representing over $1.5 billion in transaction value.

Previously, Steve oversaw treasury, asset management and private equity operations for the Dewberry Capital, an Atlanta based firm whose $500 million+ investment portfolio included hospitality, office, retail, and multi-family properties. Steve’s extensive investment banking experience encompasses a variety of industries, with notable transactions involving leading consumer facing companies such as Little Tykes, MGA Entertainment, Bumble Bee Seafoods and Whole Foods Markets. Steve has arranged mergers, acquisitions and public and private debt and equity financings, both as principal and agent, representing over $4 billion in aggregate value, including over $1 billion of debt restructuring and distressed transactions.

Brandon has over 20 years of corporate finance, treasury and operations experience, including a principal focus over the last 15 years in commercial real estate and hospitality.

Prior to joining Valor Hospitality, Brandon was Senior Vice President, Finance with Dewberry Capital Corporation, where he oversaw all asset management functions and was directly involved in the proposed conversion of a historic office building in downtown Charleston, SC into a 155 room independent luxury hotel.

Previously, Brandon served as Senior Financial Analyst with Lend Lease Real Estate Investments, where he was responsible for the preparation of equity fund returns and fund composites for the U.S. equity business, which had approximately $17 billion in assets under management.

Since graduating in Hotel Management, Tony held General Manager positions with several industry icons such as Singita, Cape Grace; One & Only Cape Town; and most recently, serving as CEO for the Collection by Liz McGrath, with responsibility for three Relais and Chateaux Hotels in Cape Town, South Africa. After more than 25 years in luxury hospitality, Tony is known as one of the leading independent hoteliers in Southern Africa.

Now in a partnership with his old friends and colleagues Euan and Michael, Tony leads Valor Hospitality Africa with the goal of becoming one of Africa’s most well respected and highest performing hospitality development, consulting and management companies. Tony has three daughters and lives in Cape Town with his family.

After receiving his Hotel management degree and growing his early management career within several of the UK's leading luxury hotels, Michael first emigrated to Cape Town in 1995, joining Southern Sun hotels.In 1998 he became General Manager of the iconic Mount Nelson Hotel, owned by Orient Express Hotels.

Staying with Orient Express, Michael moved to the USA in 2001 to become Managing Director of the recently aquired Keswick Hall Estate. Following a successful repositioning of the acclaimed hotel, golf club and luxury residential estate, Michael was offered the highly prized role of Chief Executive of Sandy Lane Resort, Barbados in 2005, overseeing many property initiatives and the hosting of the World Cup of Golf Championships. Late 2008 the family returned to Capetown when Michael was recruited to became the regional Managing Director for Taj Hotels, Palaces and Resorts, opening the Taj Capetown in 2010. Michael was a founding partner of Valor Africa (formerly PMR Hospitality) with Tony and Euan in 2013, seeking to be the leading hospitality management company in the region. Michael is based in Capetown, happily married to Caroline with three children, Tom,Hannah and Rebecca.

Originally from Mauritius, Africa, Julien has been in the hospitality industry for 20 years and has dedicated his career towards hotel project development for the past 17 years. During this time, he has been part of the development of various internationally recognized luxury hotels and mixed-use developments, which are some of the most iconic properties in the world.

Julien has over 17 years of international expertise directing significant mixed-used development, new hotel development and refurbishment projects for both new and established luxury projects in countries across the Middle East and Europe, including the One & Only Hotel & Resort, Armani Hotels, the Address Hotels & Resorts, Nikki Beach Hotels & Resorts, and SLS Hotels Dubai.

Julien is a driven leader with exceptional communication and interpersonal skills, creating value through ensuring adherence to operational and functional guidelines and brand standards during development, accelerating project deliverables, maximizing asset design development, mitigating investment cost and optimizing return on investment whilst accomplishing project objectives. Julien is an accomplished hotel individual poised to lead Valor Middle East.

Paige joined Valor as the Director of Design and Development in June 2021, bringing 25 years of experience as a practicing interior designer and small business owner.

With a successful history demonstrating proficiency in design, project management, quality control and cultivating client relationships, Paige's current role is to provide guidance to the global development and operations teams for new build and transitioning properties. Acknowledged for providing an exceptional value through the consideration of aesthetic, functional and economic dimensions of both project and process, Paige leads our development plans from concept to completion.

A graduate of Auburn University, Paige is NCIDQ (National Council for Interior Design Qualification) certified, a licensed Interior Designer in the state of Georgia, and a LEED BD+C (Building Design and Construction) accredited professional. Paige was awarded Design Excellence recognition for the conversion of the Crowne Plaza Greenville in 2014 and for the Hotel Indigo Vinings renovation in 2017.

Brian has over 25 years of experience in the hospitality industry. Educated in Ireland, he is a graduate of the Galway Hotel School. Brian spent many of his formative years with Millennium and Copthorne Hotels, including time as General Manager of the Copthorne Hotel Cardiff. He then took a change in direction and spent several years in the health and fitness industry, which included the role of Operations Director for Esporta Health Clubs. From there he went to De Vere and was COO of De Vere Hotels and Village Urban Resorts.

Brian has experience in both public and private equity funded companies and most of his career has been spent in multi-site roles with lots of experience in new openings and repositioning projects. Brian is the first Managing Director of Valor Hospitality Europe and shares the same desire as its founding partners and his European team, to create and maintain a leading management company, recognized for the quality, energy and engagement of its employees.