Star chef reveals he ploughed £13m of his own cash into restaurants
JAMIE Oliver had to plough £13m of his own money into his restaurant chain after being told it would go bust, the star chef has revealed.
In September 2017, Oliver received a call telling him that Jamie’s Italian was teetering on the edge and would go bust the next day unless he did something, the Financial Times (FT) reports.
At the time, he was filming his Channel 4 series Friday Night Feast, and he ordered filming to stop at he took in the stark news.
“We had simply run out of cash,” he said.
“We hadn’t expected it. That is just not normal, in any business. You have quarterly meetings. You do board meetings.
“People supposed to manage that stuff should manage that stuff,” he told the FT
The chef, worth £150m, told his bankers to put £7.5m into the restaurants.
“I had two hours to put money in and save it or the whole thing would go that day or the next,” he added.
“It was as bad as that and as dramatic as that.”
Over the next few months, he put a further £5.2m into the business.
“I honestly don’t know [what happened],” he admitted.
“We’re still trying to work it out, but I think that the senior management we had in place were trying to manage what they would call the perfect storm – rents, rates, the high street declining, food costs, Brexit, increase in the minimum wage. There was a lot going on.”
Chain restaurants have faced a tough few years, with Prezzo, Strada and burger chain Byron all forced to announce closures.
One reason is thought to be the changing market with people opting for takeaway firms like Deliveroo, UberEats and JustEat at home to save money.
Oliver had to close 12 of his restaurants, losing 80 staff.
The Cardiff restaurant was one of those touted with closure, but it survived.
In January there were fears the Italian restaurant on The Hayes would close as a third of the chain’s UK venues were shut as part of a restructuring plan. But Cardiff was not named as one of the 12 restaurants affected and remained open.
In an interview earlier this week he has said the city centre venue will have a revamp.
Oliver said that there had to be a fight back to save town and city centres.
He said: “The CVA (Company Voluntary Agreement) process which has become very commonplace across businesses, not just restaurants, we’re seeing how the Uberisation of food is affecting us.
“We’re seeing businesses of all types saying ‘is it a fair playing field?’ and it’s not the case.
“I was early to go and I believe we’ve done very well.
“We’ve only closed 12 restaurants, many of our competitors have closed 40, 50, 60.”
Prezzo closed 94 around the UK including Welsh branches and Strada’s Cardiff Bay branch also went.
“We’re seeing people falling away from the high street and we’re seeing rates and rent being unsustainable.
“I don’t think Cardiff was ever an option. I think the landlord here has a sober and honest view and that’s not always the case.
“And we’re looking at relaunching here next year and how we do that and what the Cardiff gang are going to get. We need to get people off the sofa and into the town centres.”
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