The Cost of Applause

What awards, packed dining rooms, and glossy headlines don’t tell you about surviving in restaurants

Recently, I opened my second restaurant. Sometimes—in casual conversations, at industry events, or through flattering headlines—I hear myself described as "successful." Each time, without fail, my gut clenches. Success feels like a borrowed jacket: ill-fitting, uncomfortable, clearly meant for someone else. Maybe it's imposter syndrome. Maybe it's the creeping sense that "success" is measured by outside perception rather than what's happening behind the scenes. Either way, the label never feels like it truly belongs to me.

Because success in restaurants is a slippery beast. From the outside, it looks simple enough—packed dining rooms, polished Instagram reels of gleaming wine glasses and flaming grills, and maybe even your name splashed in glossy magazines. But peek behind the curtain, and the reality is usually starkly different.

I remember clearly a trip to London a few years back, just over a year after opening BANK, my first place and my biggest gamble. A few of us from Bristol had travelled down for one of those industry gatherings—part curiosity, part networking, part hoping to confirm we weren't completely mad.

At the event, I found myself face-to-face with someone I genuinely admired—a veteran operator running a string of respected Bristol restaurants. When I mentioned BANK, he gripped my shoulder warmly and said, "Mate, you’re absolutely killing it. Well done."

I nodded, smiled, and played along. Inside, though, my stomach was churning like bad shellfish. Just days before, I’d drained my savings to make payroll. Suppliers were calling daily about unpaid invoices, and the overdraft was maxed out. Success? At that moment, it was nothing more than hanging on, patched up with desperation and hope.

BANK has since featured three times in Top 100 UK Restaurant lists. Each time brought a fleeting thrill—a rare validation that briefly lifted morale. But none of those accolades ever miraculously translated into profit. Public celebration masked a private struggle. We were applauded on stage but quietly scrambling to keep the lights on behind it.

Shiny plaques don’t pay the bills.

This contradiction haunted me because if you asked ten restaurateurs what success looks like, you’d get ten different answers.

For some, success equals accolades—Michelin stars, Bib Gourmands, those elusive lists. They glitter enticingly, but chasing them often ends the same way: burnout, mounting debt, and exhaustion.

Others define success as a packed reservation book, enthusiastic media coverage, and an ever-growing social media following. Yet I've stood in fully booked dining rooms, knowing the numbers still didn’t add up by the end of the night.

Then there are those quiet places—no glowing reviews, no social media frenzy, just regulars coming back faithfully week after week. Bills get paid, staff seem content, and the restaurant runs steadily, invisibly, under the radar. I think of a little Spanish restaurant on the first floor of a building in a back street in Bath—laminated menus, plastic chairs, not a whisper online—but the same faces fill it every lunchtime. Nobody photographs the patatas bravas, but the lights reliably stay on.

The restaurant owner's holy grail, of course, is somehow balancing respect, profitability, consistent trade, and a genuinely good working environment. But most of us are permanently spinning plates, sacrificing one priority to keep another alive.

Beneath this frantic pursuit lies a darker truth. I've witnessed chefs and owners obsessively chase perfection until they spiral into burnout. Kitchens become pressure cookers, powered more by anxiety than passion. Behind the curated Instagram posts, there are crumbling relationships, worsening mental health, and quiet panic attacks in the walk in. No one documents those moments on social media.

I know this because I’ve lived it. One evening, just minutes before a busy dinner service at BANK, I had a sudden panic attack outside. Frozen, unable to breathe, I cried, and then walked inside to brief the team, blaming parking issues for my lateness. Thankfully, no one noticed.

These moments force uncomfortable reflections. Have I built something real—something with financial stability, genuine community value, and space where people thrive—or is it just a beautifully lit illusion?

Once, success meant glowing reviews, accolades, and industry recognition. Now, it’s about paying my team reliably, seeing familiar faces return, and sleeping through the night without supplier-induced anxiety. It’s about creating a place that’s honest, where the figures make sense, and no one quietly breaks behind the scenes.

Ultimately, success is simpler than headlines. It’s being here—opening the doors, day after day.

This industry is brutal, relentless, often ruthless. If, after all that, you’re still standing—that might just be the only success that matters.