Tom Kerridge: Hospitality is not just about making money

Tom Kerridge has confessed he makes more money from “being Tom Kerridge than being a chef”.

He told the Sunday Times his two-Michelin-starred Hand and Flowers pub in Marlow, Buckinghamshire, as well as his other four restaurants, is “making no money at all”.

The chef said this was the reality for many working in the hospitality industry and that the increased cost of business has contributed to menu prices going up.

Despite these challenges, he clarified he had no plans to close any of his premises, having told the paper: “When you do hospitality, you’re not doing it just because you’re making money. You do it because it’s a vocation you love and the trade is full of wonderful people…  you have a sense of responsibility to keep doing what you do, irrespective of what happens to the profit margins at the moment.”

The chef is also a popular media personality as a long-serving judge on Great British Menu, which started airing its 21st series last month. 

Kerridge called for VAT on pubs and restaurants to be halved to 10% amid the onslaught of further cost pressures from increased business rates and National Minimum Wage kicking into force from April.

The chef is a huge advocate of the industry, having told The Caterer for the This Is Hospitality campaign that you can “live your best life” in hospitality.

The Hand & Flowers was Kerridge’s first restaurant and it celebrated its 20th anniversary last year. It won its first Michelin star within its first year and its second in 2012.

Kerridge also won The Caterer’s Restaurateur of the Year – Independent award at the 2020 Cateys and was invited to cook for the event itself in 2012.