Apparently Things Are Looking Up for Gordon Ramsay’s Restaurant Group

Gordon Ramsay’s has announced that his restaurant group has made a return to profit. The Guardian reports that the celebrity chef has recorded a pre-tax profit of £500,000 in the year to August 2018. It marks a return to “the black” for the chef’s group, which in the year preceding the latest results, posted a which posted a £3.8 million loss.

Ramsay says that although market conditions were challenging — his old foe Jamie Oliver last weekend announced that his own restaurant group had collapsed — his group performed strongly, with a 4.3 percent rise in sales to £53.6 million, the Guardian reports.

Ramsay wants to expand his fast casual Street Pizza brand, which serves unlimited amounts of pizza. He says that he wants to take this outside of London, despite the “much-maligned market conditions”.

The group was also reportedly in talks with a London- and Los Angeles-based private equity firm, Lion Capital, last autumn about new investment designed to expand Ramsay’s brand across America. Reports then suggested that he could open up to 100 burger restaurants across the United States.

The Gordon Ramsay Group’s international portfolio of 31 restaurants (with 15 in London) last turned a profit in the year to August 2016, after five years’ loss-making. Stuart Gillies, the CEO credited “changing the company’s business model” by making the group’s restaurants more accessible and that resultant upturn, left the company last year, announcing that he was launching his own restaurant business, Alfa-Zero, with a trademark application for Wood & Wood registered in April 2018.

Ramsay, meanwhile, will open his first restaurant in London since 2014 next month as Lucky Cat — his controversial “Asian eating house” — replaces Maze in Mayfair. The Guardian reports that Lucky Cat has already received 3,000 reservations ahead of its opening on 24 June.

• Gordon Ramsay defies restaurant industry struggles with rise in sales [The Guardian]