In Episode 21 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with legendary chef Michael Bonacini. Michael was born in South Wales. He trained classically under legendary Chef Anton Mosimann at London’s Dorchester Hotel. Micheal is today one of the most famous Canadian chefs and has written multiple cookbooks as well as hosting many of his own Tv shows on American Tv.  Micheal partnered up with Peter Oliver in 1993 and founded Oliver & Bonacini restaurants. Oliver & Bonacini...

In Episode 20 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with the co-owner of the well known Vancouver hotspot Jam Cafe.  Mike has a long and successful career in the restaurant industry and before Jam cafe, was the director of operations of the Aburi restaurant group in Canada where he oversaw 4 restaurants, 400 staff and a yearly revenue of 20 million. Jam cafe opened their first branch in Victoria, Vancouver in 2012 by husband and wife team Jim and Candy Walmsley and Mike partnered up...

In Episode 19 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with the well known Irish business owner Brody Sweeney.   Brody Sweeney is probably most well known for founding O'Briens Irish Sandwich Bars which went from start up  in 1998 to over 200 stores in over 13 countries globally. Prior to that he was involved with the franchise Prontoprint before selling the business back to the U.K. parent in 1988. He has written two business guides, Making Bread and "Small to Tall" - How to grow your...

In Episode 18 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with legendary  UK chef Phil Howard.  Phil is a co-proprietor for the Michelin-starred Kitchen W8, The Ledbury (now closed), Church Road in Barnes and Union in La Plagne Montalbert, a ski resort and village in France. He also has interests in the London restaurants Lorne and Perilla, and is an investor in The Wild Room, which supplies foraged ingredients, mushrooms and truffles to the restaurant trade. In 2011, he picked up a Catey...

In Episode 17 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with Will Beckett who is the founder and owner of The Hawksmoor Restaurant Group. There are 6 Hawksmoor restaurants in London, a location each in Edinburgh and Manchester and most recently the group opened a Hawksmoor in the heart of Gramercy in New York City. I chat with Will about his many 'failures' in the restaurant industry before the success of opening Hawksmoor, the challenges in the early days of Hawksmoor, the London...

In Episode 16 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with Domini Kemp who is the founder and owner of The Itsa Restaurant Group. Domini is a chef, cookbook author, tv personality and the founder of one of the leading restaurant groups in Ireland, The Itsa Group. We hear from Domini about her early career working in Peacock Alley with Conrad Gallagher, opening her first restaurant, a small bagel shop called Itsa in Dublin, scaling the restaurant, opening multiple restaurant concepts,...

In Episode 15 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with Lorraine Heskin who is the founder and owner of The Gourmet Food Parlour Restaurant Group. There are 6 restaurants across Ireland at present and there are also a whole range of other parts of the business under the one GFP umbrella, including a very successful catering side to the business where Lorraine has a 5000sq ft unit in Dublin catering for everything from Weddings to birthday partys. We hear from Lorraine about her...

In Episode 14 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I chat with Mark Lamming who is the owner, along with his wife Paula, of a chain of bakeries in Canada called Purebread. We hear from Mark about the Covid situation in Vancouver at present, opening his first Bakery, going from street food to brick and mortar, the reasons for the success of PureBread, doing things differently in the industry,  staying on top, the branding process, opening multiple locations, creating a central production...

In Episode 13 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I speak with Brendan Ladner the owner of Smak Restaurants Group. Brendan currently has 3 locations in Vancouver, Canada. Smak specialises in healthy fast food and has been a real success story since its first store opening in 2013. In this episode I chat with Brendan about his time in business, Healthy fast food, sustainability in restaurants, opening up his own restaurant Smak, replicating the concept in multiple locations in Vancouver...

In Episode 12 of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, I speak with Garret Fitzgerald the owner of Chimac Restaurantin Dublin. Chimac is a unique restaurant on the Dublin food scene specialising in two things: Fried chicken and beer. A match made in heaven, right? Koreans love the combo so damn much they’ve dedicated a whole word to it. Pretty much a national pastime, Chimac comes from “chi”, short for “chikin” plus “mac” from "maekju", Korean for beer. ​ Inspired by this fried chicken...

Paul Lenehan is the owner of a number of bars and restuarants in Kildare and Dublin including Harte's, Ashtons, Dew Drop and most recently Firecastle. In The Business of Restaurants Podcast Episode 11, I chat with Paul about his training in GMIT Hotel school, opening his first pub, the Kildare restaurant scene, opening a business during the economic crisis in Ireland in 2009, opening the 'hybrid' Firecastle in 2020, the "opportunities" that Covid gave the business, the future of the Irish pub...

Jules Mak is one of the up and coming restaurant owners in Dublin owning some of the most new restaurants to open in the city in recent years. He is the man behind Mak at D6 and also most recently Hush, which is a sandwich restaurant by day and a burger restaurant by night concept. I chat to Jules about his early upbringing in the restaurant world working in his Dad's restaurant, opening his first restaurant, creating a new age Chinese restaurant, some struggles in the early years, the...

The Business of Restaurants Podcast Episode 9 with David Dunne. David Dunne is the owner of two of the best restaurants in Sligo - Knox and Flipside. Knox is an all day gourmet cafe and Flipside is a high end burger restaurant doing what some believe are the best burgers in Ireland! In this episode, I chat to David about his career in corporate finance and how that helped Knox, the logistics of opening his very first restaurant, opening a restaurant in an urban town, challenges to running a...

Mark Spagnuolo is the owner of Hoagitos Restaurant in Belmar New Jersey. Hoagitos is a bite sized sandwich restaurant serving really exciting gourmet sandwiches. In The Business of Restaurants Podcast Episode 8, we chat to Mark about his background before going into the restaurant industry, opening the very first Hoagitos and subsequently closing it down, mistakes they made in the early days, Instagram for Restaurants, how they adapted during Covid and some exciting expansion plans with...

Chef Adrian Martin is a celebrity chef, cookbook author and tv presenter from Cavan in Ireland. He is well known in Ireland as a tv chef and has appeared on a number of television series and also has writtern multiple award winning cookbooks. In March 2020, Adrian opened his own restaurant  called Wildflower in a shipping container in Camden in London. In this episode of The Business of Restaurants Podcast, we chat about Adrian's early career to date working in restaurants, becoming a...

Oran McGonagle is an Irishman from Donegal who now owns and runs his own restaurant group in Boston. In this chat we discuss his story moving to Boston and living the 'American Dream', striking lucky working for the East Coast Tavern Group, openeing new restaurant concepts, the importance of staff, ambitions to open the best bar in America and plenty more!

Colm McDonagh is a well known entrepreneur and businessman in Galway who is most well known for owning his own travel agency business in Galway for 30 years. In 2015, Colm along with his wife Caryl, swapped industries and went into the food business and opened Esquires cafe on Eyre Square. In this episode, I chat with Colm about his younger days and his entrepreneurial upbringing, leaving the travel business as he saw the industry was going to the web, opening up Esquires coffee shop,...

Rúibín is a contemporary bar & restaurant located in Galway City on Ireland's Wild Atlantic way, the brainchild of couple Richard Kennan & Alice Jary. Their ethos is to cook & create using the best seasonal Irish produce they can find and pairing this with influence & inspiration from flavours around the world. The pair spent numerous years travelling and soaking up different cultures, before bringing this knowledge back home to Galway’s Historic Docklands. In this episode, I...

Cathal Keogh is the owner of Mocha Beans Coffee Group, which currently has 11 coffee shops located across Ireland. Cathal is from Galway and opened his very first Mocha beans in his hometown on Cross Street in 1997, over 20 years later it is still there today! In this episode, I spoke to Cathal about his early career working his way up in Campbell Catering, learning the business of coffee with Bewleys, creating a brand for your business, some very low points along the way where everything...

David Moore has been a prominent figure in the hospitality industry since starting his career at The Box Tree, Ilkley over 30 years ago.  He went on to spend 6 years at Le Manoir aux Quat Saison, in Oxford with Raymond Blanc before founding Restaurant Pied à Terre, in 1991.  L’Autre Pied followed in 2007 and the acclaimed pop-up Pieds Nus, in 2013. In spite of new ventures, David is never far from Pied à Terre.  As an established restaurateur he is constantly evolving in the industry and...

For the very first episode of The Business of Restaurants podcast, we catch up with Galway woman Sinead Campbell  who is the co-owner of the very exciting Bong Bong's restaurant in London. Sinead, along with her partner Lee Johnson, won the BBC television show Million Pound menu and opened their own restaurant in late 2019 to huge acclaim. Bong Bong's was unfortunately one of the restaurant casualites of the 2020 pandemic and closed there doors of their Hackney restaurant in November 2020,...