A conversation with Gregory Sides, Vice President of Operations, Aramark’s Salute Hospitality
Gregory Sides spent twelve years in uniform before spending his career improving the dining programs that serve the people who wear it. As Vice President of Operations for Aramark’s Salute Hospitality, he manages food service operations across Air Force installations and leads the expansion into new branches. We asked him what most civilian operators get wrong about military dining, how branch culture shapes everything from menu design to throughput, and what a credible partnership with the government requires
You spent twelve years as a leader in the Air Force. When you walk into a dining facility today, what are you evaluating?
The first thing to notice is whether the team knows what they're serving. It sounds simple, but it's not always a given.Early in my career, before I joined Aramark, I was at a joint Army and Air Force training exercise and asked the service member serving the food what the protein was. He looked me in the eye and said he had no idea. It showed me how easy it is to treat feeding a force as an afterthought.
When I walk a facility now, I am looking at whether the people running the line understand the food, whether the service member feels respected by what is in front of them, and whether the program is built around their schedule or ours. Those three things tell me almost everything
What do most civilian operators miss about working with the military?
The biggest misconception is that all branches operate the same way. They do not. They have different mission sets, different cultures, and different relationships to food and time.
The Air Force model is about quality, variety, and dwell time. Every dining facility has a community space built around bringing service members together. A foosball table, a lounge area, something that signals we want you to stay. The program looks more like a collegiate environment than what most people picture when they think about military dining.
For example, if you walk into an Army installation using an Air Force playbook, you will miss the mark entirely. The language is different, the priorities are different, the relationship between command and the dining program is different. Operators who do not do their homework before the first site visit have already started behind.
How does your own military background affect how you operate in this role?
That background allows me to speak the same language as commanders and contracting officers. Sitting down with them means reading the communication structure, knowing when to speak and when to receive, and understanding what happens when something gets routed to the wrong level. Small things carry weight. Knowing the Army calls their installations forts, not bases, is one example. Getting that right in a meeting is part of showing up prepared.
After my time in uniform, I spent my career on the private sector side of these conversations. That puts me in both cultures at once. I have seen how a private sector operator thinks about a problem and how a commanding officer approaches the same problem. In this role, that matters every day
Salute has positioned itself as more than a food service provider. What does that mean operationally?
The vision is to create a lifelong relationship with every service member, beginning the day they enter initial training and continuing throughout their military career. From their first duty station through retirement and veteran status, our DFACs remain a trusted resource and a place they can access throughout their journey, creating a relationship that extends well beyond their time in uniform.
The infrastructure to support that is already there. Aramark is not only a food company. We have supply chain, facilities management, housekeeping, and maintenance divisions. Every installation has a hotel, grounds, equipment that needs servicing. Salute's argument is that we are not a vendor managing one contract. We are a partner capable of covering the majority of services on an installation, and we are the only American-owned company in our competitive set.
How is Salute building that trust with decision makers across new branches?
We participate in industry days, we are active in Society for Hospitality and Foodservice Management (SHFM) and Research & Development Associates for Military Food and Packaging (R&DA), and we are in the rooms where contracting officers and branch food service leadership are having conversations about the next generation of military dining before a solicitation is written.
Salute has been running Food 2.0 on Air Force installations for fifteen years. That is not a pilot or a proof of concept. That is a mature track record. Every new branch conversation starts from that foundation.
What drives your commitment to military dining, and how does that shape how Salute operates?
My commitment is simple, and it has not changed since I wore the uniform: the people who serve this country deserve to be fed to a standard worthy of what they do. That belief is what Salute Hospitality is built on.
It shapes how we measure success. A service member walks into the dining facility because they want to, not because they have to. When that happens, the renewals and the participation numbers take care of themselves. When a service member eats well and performs well, the program has earned its place. That is the work.
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Gregory Sides is Vice President of Operations for Salute Hospitality, overseeing dining across 14 military installations and other government facilities.
He leads a team of more than 40 managers and 5 directors across complex, high-volume dining environments that support military personnel and enterprise clients.
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