Mabel, founded by former WPP brand strategist turned award-winning chef and entrepreneur Jason Hartley, alongside head chef Jamie Guy, previously of The Devonshire and HIX, has opened its first pilot at Shoreditch Exchange in east London.

The brand is introducing a new food format: fresh, chef-made grab-and-go food, prepared daily in its London kitchen, served from intelligent, unattended units and available to customers in seconds.

The idea is built around a problem most people recognise. Britain wants to eat better on the move, but too often the food available during the busiest parts of the day is either disappointing, ultra-processed or hard to access.

Every dish is prepared fresh using the best British produce before being delivered into unique, highly branded, smart refrigerated units. This is unlike any form of vending consumers have seen before. Customers can browse at the machine or pre-order via the Mabel app, collecting their food in seconds by scanning a QR code, accessing unique discounts and building rewards every time they buy.

Unlike traditional convenience retail, Mabel’s model removes the costs of staffed retail and instead focuses investment on food quality, sourcing and kitchen operations. Its autonomous units use machine learning and agentic AI technology to predict demand and adjust stock throughout the day, and across the network, helping maintain supply while significantly reducing food waste.

The result is chef-made wraps and sandwiches priced at £5–8 and gourmet salads at £8–10, celebrating great British regional produce through a unit model designed to remain economically viable in spaces where staffed retail cannot operate.

Jason Hartley, Founder and CEO of Mabel, said:

“We’ve normalised bad food because it’s convenient. That seems like a crazy compromise.

“Mabel started with a simple question: why is some of the worst food people eat often eaten when they’re busiest, most tired or most in need of something decent?

“Workplaces, stations, airports, gyms, hospitals, universities, hotels and residential buildings are places where people are already living their day. They shouldn’t have to choose between expensive delivery, sad grab-and-go or skipping a meal.

“We built Mabel to work around real life: fresh food made by chefs, British produce where it matters, and intelligent, unmanned retail that makes better food easier to access.

“This isn’t just about making food cheaper or faster. It’s about making what people get for their money better.”

Behind the scenes, Mabel’s connected units use machine learning and agentic AI technology to help predict demand by site, time of day and product. This allows the business to manage stock more intelligently, adjust menus to site demand and reduce end-of-day food waste.

For Jamie Guy, the appeal was the chance to bring a producer-led philosophy into places where people do not usually expect to find it.

“You don’t need a restaurant setting to offer great ingredients and transparency,” said Guy.

“You need to combine good people who care about creating great produce with people making great food in a way that allows quality to scale. That’s what excited me about Mabel. It takes the standards people associate with good independent restaurants and puts them into a new format in everyday spaces where people actually eat.”

Mabel is designed for locations where fresh food has traditionally been harder to access, including workplaces, transport hubs, hospitals, universities, residential schemes, gyms, cultural venues, hotels and late-shift environments.

Shoreditch Exchange is the first of three pilots confirmed for Q2 and Q3 2026. Active conversations are underway with clients across transport, estate management, fitness and accommodation. Mabel is targeting 60 sites across London by the end of 2027, with the next site expected to open in August.

Phase two will introduce heat-to-eat ready meals, extending Mabel into evening, residential and shift-worker demand.

For more information, visit eatmabel.com or follow @eatmabel.