Sir Reo Stakis (born Argyros Anastasis; 13 March 1913 – 28 August 2001) was a Cypriot hotel magnate, longtime head of

Stakis Hotels Stakis Hotels was a hotel chain in the United Kingdom led by Sir Reo Stakis, headquartered in Glasgow. History The company was founded by Reo Stakis in the 1930s. It was sold to Hilton Group Ladbrokes Coral is a British gambling compan ...

Biography

He was born in

Kato Drys Kato Drys () is a small village in Cyprus, southwest of Larnaca. It is near the villages of Pano Lefkara (4 km), Kato Lefkara (4 km), and Vavla (6 km). Its average altitude is 520 meters above sea level. The village is set in hi ...

, Cyprus, 13 March 1913 and left for Scotland in 1928, aged 14. He started selling his mother's handmade lace door-to-door and gradually headed north, settling in Glasgow. By the 1940s, Stakis was involved in his first restaurant, the Victory in Glasgow, whose affordable prices began to change the way Scottish people dined out. By the 1960s, he had a chain of thirty restaurants and hotels throughout Scotland. In 1962, he bought the Dunblane Hydro Hotel, which was run-down yet within six months he had returned it to profit. Stakis was to make his home in the grounds of that hotel. Stakis opened Scotland's first casino, the Chevalier, in 1964 and gradually added several other casinos to the Stakis group. However, his flagship hotel, The Grosvenor, was destroyed by fire in 1978. He was knighted in 1988. By that time Stakis' son Andros had taken over the business and in difficult trading conditions, some poor decisions brought the company close to bankruptcy. However, new management brought renewed profitability and Stakis was able to sell his empire to the

Hilton Group Ladbrokes Coral is a British gambling company. Its product offering includes sports betting, online casino, online poker, and online bingo. The Ladbrokes portion of the group was established in 1886, and Coral in 1926. In November 2016, the ...

for £1.2 billion in 1999. He was Chairman of Stakis plc from 1947–1991, and President 1986-1999. He married Annitsa Petropoulos in 1946, and they had two sons and four daughters. Stakis was a generous benefactor to the Greek Orthodox church in Glasgow, buying both their first church in the city in 1953 and their Cathedral of St Luke the Evangelist in 1960. Stakis died in

Stirling Stirling (; ; ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in Central Belt, central Scotland, northeast of Glasgow and north-west of Edinburgh. The market town#Scotland, market town, surrounded by rich farmland, grew up connecting the roya ...

on 28 August 2001. He is buried in

Dunblane Dunblane (, ) is a town in the council area of Stirling in central Scotland, and inside the historic boundaries of the county of Perthshire. It is a commuter town, with many residents making use of good transport links to much of the Central Be ...

Cemetery. Scottish journalist Jack Webster wrote his biography ''Stakis: The Reo Stakis Story''.

External links

Independent obituary

Conworld.net obituary
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stakis, Reo 1913 births 2001 deaths British people of Cypriot descent Scottish people of Cypriot descent Businesspeople awarded knighthoods Businesspeople from Glasgow Scottish philanthropists British hoteliers Knights Bachelor Cypriot emigrants to Scotland 20th-century British philanthropists 20th-century Scottish businesspeople Scottish company founders Scottish people of Greek Cypriot descent