OUR Team

NICK FRESHMAN

Founder

For 30 years, Nick has been a driving force in the hospitality industry, combining his entrepreneurial mindset with deep operational expertise to help businesses thrive.

As founder of Mothersauce Partners, Nick leads a dynamic consultancy that provides a wide variety of services to a broad range of clients. 

A former college basketball player and lifelong lover of the game, Nick leverages his appreciation and knowledge of the unique nutritional and lifestyle demands of high-performance athletes and their organizations  to develop specialized food and beverage solutions. Supported by a team of former collegiate athletes who share the same mindset and knowledge, Nick works with the best in the game to make them better.

Not limited to sports, Nick’s hands-on experience across every facet of the industry helps clients of all types develop new concepts, build teams, improve operational efficiency, raise capital and make their ideas become reality.

As an industry leader, Nick channels his passion for hospitality and to help others succeed. He has served on boards, volunteered his time and enjoys mentoring the next generation of professionals in the industry.

Adam D. Stein

Partner

Adam Stein is a dynamic and seasoned veteran of the industry who brings a skillset to projects that is largely unmatched. Chef, Owner, General Contractor, Designer—just a few of the hats that he wears and the resources he can bring to bear.

A liberal arts degree from Antioch College and a culinary degree from Johnson & Wales gave Adam the educational foundation to dive headfirst into his passion—food. He has twenty years of experience in the business with over ten years as an Executive Chef. He is particularly skilled at restaurant openings, having guided the launch of 16 projects over his career.

Adam also has eight years of hands-on General Contracting experience bringing a working understanding of seeing a restaurant through design and construction offering him the ability to act as project manager and even doing finish work himself. Given the frequent challenges in restaurant construction, this is a uniquely valuable asset.

Over his career, Adam has built an extensive network of valuable connections from construction, maintenance, food and beverage purveyors and equipment suppliers, to architects, PR people and graphic designers. He has strong ties to the DC Restaurant/Bar scene as well as with Restaurant/Food press, blogs and organizations.

NED LAVELLE

Associate

With a passion for hospitality, leadership, and innovation, Ned Lavelle brings a wealth of experience in business operations, technology, and restaurant development to all of his projects.

A Dallas native, Ned was recruited to play basketball at the United States Military Academy, where he studied Computer Science and earned a place on the Dean’s List. After serving as a U.S. Army Captain in Hawaii, Kuwait, and Texas, he pursued his MBA at the University of Texas.

Ned’s entrepreneurial journey began with franchising Jimmy John’s in Austin, where he grew to six locations and was a finalist for Small Franchisee of the Year.

He then co-founded Pinthouse Pizza, which has become the largest brewpub group in the South and Southwest, winning numerous national awards for their beer As a chef, operator, and technology leader, Ned played a key role in shaping Pinthouse’s success and now serves as Board Chair, guiding its continued growth.

Ned’s unique expertise lies in combining hospitality, leadership, and technology to create exceptional guest experiences and operational excellence.

SAM GROH

Associate

Samuel Groh has over 20 years of operations, sales, and senior management excellence in the food service and hospitality industry.  He is a versatile, profit-driven senior executive with a unique ability to redesign customer experiences and operating models to increase growth and customer satisfaction. An expert communicator and strategist with a long history of turning around business operations to reduce waste, improve sustainability, and boost employee morale.

He has worked for larger corporations and smaller start-up companies. At NoVa startup HUNGRY, Sam developed and opened Hungry’s Café & Coffee Bar locations in multiple markets. This work included creating operational SOP’s for all facets of the business (revenue, POS structure, marketing, equipment, labor, financials) that focus on efficiencies as well as overall profitability including an emphasis on working closely with clients.

As the general manager for Restaurant Associates, Samuel headed the development and execution of the operations and account management for several premier DC accounts: The United States Senate, The World Bank and George Washington University. His responsibilities and expertise have included overseeing P&L, strategy, HR, finance, sales, marketing, equipment management, and general operations.

As an onsite operations expert and point of contact for clients, tenants and landlords, Sam offers these stakeholders singular comfort and expertise.

Steve MANNINO

Executive Chef

Steve Mannino brings an innovative brand of cooking that is fun and approachable, belying the immense experience and talent behind the menus. His honest and passionate cooking is short on shortcuts & long on character.

Steve’s decades of experience in some of the world’s best kitchens with renowned chefs has given him deep knowledge and a broad skill set.

Steve is a sought-after personal chef with years of experience working with elite athletes. With the best of the best, he uses his culinary knowledge and experience along with his fine tuned interpersonal skills to offer his clients exactly what they need.

Working with team nutritionists to construct menus that meet the needs of the world’s greatest athletes, Steve is an expert at taking care of his clients, and he does it with total discretion and respect for the unique lives of these clients.

The greatest example of his dedication to feeding athletes is in his own home kitchen where he is the proud Dad of the starting quarterback at Marist, and a shooting guard at Harvard. Steve has worked with every coach they have had to help them and their teams be successful by getting the right fuel.

ALISSA AVILOV

Associate

With over a decade of experience in operations and hospitality, Alissa is a dedicated professional who thrives on creating exceptional experiences for customers and employees.

Having honed her skills at companies like WeWork and Clover Food Lab, Alissa understands the nuances of the hospitality industry and the importance of a seamless customer experience at scale. She believes that a happy team leads to happy customers, and is fervently devoted to empowering employees and building internal culture alongside customer-focused strategies.

Alissa is deeply integrated within the food and beverage community and champions small businesses at every opportunity. Her approach to unique programming, events, and marketing is always rooted in understanding what customers really value and want.

ALEXIS THORNLOW

Creative Director

With over 20 years of experience in the design and branding field, Alexis executes projects on a wide range of visual and digital materials. As Creative Director, she enthusiastically creates logos, websites, print collateral, internal/external corporate signage, advertisements, pitch decks, sell sheets, trade show booths, social media layouts, menu design, packaging, brochures, print collateral, apparel design, holiday cards, animations and infographics.

Before joining Mothersauce Partners, Alexis worked as Lead Designer at TIG Global where she developed, refreshed and maintained restaurant and hospitality brands for Hilton, Hyatt and Marriott Hotels. Her experience with the restaurant industry has allowed her to create the branding for many restaurants in the Washington, DC area including Toki Underground, Reverie, The Freshman, The Eleanor, Bar Elena, Red Light, Songbyrd Cafe, Pow Pow, and Dirty South Deli.

MARK ROBERTSON

Director of Catering

Mark Robertson's background in catering, sales and marketing encompasses previous roles in event production at Occasions Caterers; as well as in sales and marketing with esteemed members of Small Luxury Hotels of the World, including Delamar Greenwich Harbor, and Virtuoso hotels—a collection of some of the world's best luxury and boutique hotels; elegant spas and world-class resorts.

Throughout his career, Robertson has also helmed local and regional sales and marketing teams for Triumph Hotels and Kimpton Hotels. Robertson is a graduate of Bournemouth University in Dorset, United Kingdom.

MELISSA SARVER

CFO

As a CPA with over 20 years running her own consulting business, Melissa provides financial support to 15+ clients across a variety of industries.  Financial support includes preparation of monthly financial reports, reconciliation of bank and credit card statements, processing vendor invoices and payments, processing of payroll, monthly sales tax filings, building and monitoring of annual budgets, processing of 1099s, working with tax accountants to get annual returns processed and filed and other accounting/financial responsibilities.  

Prior to starting her own consulting business Melissa was the CFO and Treasurer at the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), a nonprofit, where she worked with NTI’s executives and Board of Directors for all things accounting/finance.  Melissa also worked for KPMG, LLP in the Business Process Outsourcing division where she served as on-site manager for non-profit trade and community-oriented associations, which included overseeing general ledger, payroll, accounts payable and accounts receivable processes.

Over the years Melissa has lent her skills by volunteering on Boards of her children’s school’s PTAs/PTSAs as the Treasurer and other small community non-profits.