Now, AI and automation are opening up new possibilities with systems built not just to accelerate human effort, but to take on the heavy lifting entirely.

That’s the thinking behind OpenTable’s latest product innovations. Our most comprehensive update yet weaves AI into daily operations, with new capabilities that help restaurants bring in more guests, surface the right insights, and connect the systems they already use.

The goal isn’t to add more technology to the restaurant. It’s to make technology feel like less work.

“Great service is service that you don’t recognize… Even though there’s more technology, the technology disappears.” — Dustin Falcon, Executive Chef, Niku Steakhouse

To see what that shift actually looks like, OpenTable CTO Sagar Mehta sat down with the team at Niku Steakhouse (Omakase Restaurant Group). Their experience offers a glimpse into what’s possible when technology quietly handles more of the operational burden.

At Niku, the time created by new table automations is already finding its way back into the restaurant. In the kitchen, the team has more room to experiment with new menu ideas and test them. On the floor, the FOH team has more time to engage and connect with guests.

So what are the numbers?

• 17x increase in seated diners driven by OpenTable’s AI search integrations, compared with last year*

• 2M+ table automations have run across restaurants in testing**

• 4.5 hours saved per operator each month in testing***

These numbers reflect a clear vision for the industry’s future: technology quietly taking on the burden of admin so hospitality teams can return their focus to what actually matters—their guests.

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*Based on global OpenTable internal data from January 1- July 1, 2026 vs January 1-July 1, 2025

**Based on OpenTable analysis, June 2026

***Based on OpenTable analysis of restaurant floorplans used during a shift where an automation was published from April 2026 - July 2026.

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Anthony Bourdain is revered as one of the greatest culinary voices of our time. His remarkable ability to connect with people across the hospitality industry and beyond is still admired to this day.

A24’s TONY explores Bourdain’s origin story—a time before the international acclaim, when he was just a dishwasher at a restaurant in Provincetown. The film sees a 19-year-old Tony navigate the underbelly of the culinary world, finding companionship and courage during a period of his life when he was still figuring out who he wanted to become.

Much like Tony in the film, and the real life Bourdain, a young chef’s rise in the industry is shaped by the many diverse people they meet, the places they work, and the experiences that they endure beyond the pass. Bourdain was and still is, a beacon of inspiration to generations of hospitality professionals, both as a literary voice and culinary expert.

To celebrate the release of TONY, we partnered A24 and Square to invite restaurant servers, hosts, bartenders, line cooks, and chefs to watch the film together in local theaters across the US. Because at the heart of Bourdain’s story was his ability to foster community with people in the industry and beyond.

That same spirit inspired us to ask chefs to write letters to chef Anthony, sharing what his indelible life and work have meant to them.

June Rodil, MS, CEO & Partner, Goodnight Hospitality

“What Bourdain captured in the Philippines was bigger than food. He understood the balikbayan heart, the longing for home, and the fierce joy of people who will feed you generously no matter how little they have. That episode [No Reservations] cracked me open!”

Biplaw Rai, Co-Founder & CEO, Pearl & Law Hospitality

I think many of us miss Anthony Bourdain’s voice, especially today. He had a remarkable ability to remind us of our shared humanity and to shine a light on people whose stories too often went unheard. He encouraged us to look beyond ourselves, to travel with open minds, and to see food as a bridge rather than a barrier. That’s a legacy worth celebrating.”

Brian Howard, Chef, Sparrow & Wolf

“Anthony Bourdain reminded us that chefs have always been a bit like pirates. We leave home, chase adventure, collect stories, challenge convention, and occasionally stir up a little trouble in pursuit of something extraordinary. That spirit is one of the reasons so many of us connected with him.

He wasn’t interested in polished perfection. He was interested in authenticity. He celebrated the people working behind the scenes, the neighborhood spots that rarely made headlines, and the cultures that deserve to be understood instead of simply consumed. He showed us that hospitality isn’t about putting ourselves on a pedestal; it’s about pulling up a chair at someone else’s table with respect and genuine curiosity.

As someone who’s spent my career building restaurants and leading teams, that’s something I’ve carried with me. Every dish has a story, every ingredient has a history, and every guest arrives with an opportunity to connect. Those ideas are part of the culture we’re trying to build every day. His legacy reminds us to keep exploring, keep asking questions, and never stop looking for the next story worth telling.”

Tara Monsod, Chef, Animae & Le Coq

“Bourdain taught me to stay curious: to ask questions, chase the unfamiliar, and let food be the lens I see a culture through. That’s how I cook, and how I travel.”

Stuart Brioza & Nicole Krasinski, Chef & Owners, State Bird Provisions, The Progress and The Anchovy Bar

“I think we can all agree, Tony’s summer of 1975 in Provincetown has had an impact on all of us in one way shape or form. Anthony Bourdain’s brilliance was his optimism & curiosity, coupled with his cunning cynicism. He pays homage to the best things in life produced by the blue collar working culture. His “leave your travel book at home” philosophy inspires us, and our own travels to this day. Thanks Tony!”

Jon Sybert, Chef & Co-owner, Rye Bunny

"I discovered the romance behind the chaos of restaurants at a time in my life where I badly craved the purpose that discovery brings. Thank god for public libraries, for writers like Anthony who capture the true spirit of a thing."

Felipe Riccio, Chef Partner, Goodnight Hospitality

“Every profession has people who redefine what’s possible. Anthony Bourdain was one of those people.

He taught us that food is never just food. It is history, identity, migration, and above all, a way of understanding another person.

What I admired most was not where he traveled. It was the way he approached every table, certain there was something there worth learning. Whether he was sitting with Ferran Adrià or someone cooking over a small fire halfway around the world, he offered them the same respect. Every person had a story worth hearing.

His story also reminds us of something harder. Despite all of his success and influence, Anthony struggled with profound pain. His death reminded us that talent and admiration do not protect someone from suffering. I hope one part of his legacy is that we continue caring for one another with the same generosity and care that he showed the world.

The film tells the story before the books, before television, and before the world knew his name. It begins with Tony, a young man searching for purpose in a restaurant kitchen.

Many in the industry see their work differently because of him. Now, it’s our turn to carry forward his openness, his honesty, and his refusal to compromise.”

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Sustainability starts with humans

Whitaker approaches sustainability as a human-first practice. For him, the goal extends beyond responsible ingredient sourcing to creating meaningful work for the people behind the scenes.

“Impact ideas are not just about what’s on the plate,” he says. “It’s about the people who work here. What they are trying to get from this job—a nutritional family meal, a paycheck, an education. Those things matter just as much as the food.”

This mindset shapes everything from training to ingredient sourcing. At Whitaker’s concepts, like The Wolf’s Tailor and Bruto, team members do more than simply work a shift; they learn hands-on skills like fermentation, milling techniques with heirloom grains, and modern service techniques. By investing in education, Whitaker ensures they’re building long-term careers—the same sustained thinking he applies to every part of his restaurants. “We focus on helping people learn,” he explains.

From waste reduction to regenerative agriculture

As Whitaker’s thinking has evolved, so has his definition of impact. He’s moved beyond minimizing waste toward choosing ingredients that actively improve the environment and contribute to healthier systems.

“If you’re cooking with oysters, they clean the water,” he says. “If you’re cooking with the grains we grow, you’re rebuilding soil and sequestering carbon. The food itself can be a part of the solution.” That shift into regenerative agriculture began with a simple need: flour. “I just wanted better flour,” he says. Whitaker approached regenerative farmers that grow potatoes as a primary crop and asked if they would be willing to grow different heirloom varieties of wheat instead of the wheat cover crop they typically use. “This started everything.”

Those early conversations with farmers grew into long-term partnerships and experimentation with new crops and practices. What started as a sourcing effort eventually expanded into a business with over 800 acres of regenerative farmland. Whitaker realized the work had not only grown his kitchen—it was now also contributing to the health of the entire region’s ecosystem.

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Working with farmers, not around them

Rather than relying on large-scale distributors, Whitaker prefers to work directly with farmers. This collaboration creates the consistent demand that allows growers to confidently invest in sustainable practices, which in turn gives restaurants access to exceptional ingredients.

By aligning menus with seasonality and regenerative agriculture principals, Whitaker and his team make sustainable farming more viable. The key, he says, is understanding what farmers actually need.

“Find out what’s holding farmers back when it comes to regenerative practices or growing diverse new crop varieties like corn for masa,” he explains. “Once the farmer commits then we try to help further create demand by representing it in our restaurant.”

Turning kitchen scraps into something useful

At The Wolf’s Tailor, reducing waste often starts with creativity. For example, the team’s recent corn-focused menu led them to explore the entire plant—not only the parts that end up on the plate. Today, corn husks that would normally be thrown away are transformed into cutlery and other functional items for the dining room. It’s just one way the team is rethinking waste in the kitchen.

Whitaker doesn’t expect every guest to leave with a full understanding of regenerative agriculture. Curiosity is enough.

“I’m okay if people just taste something cool and get curious about the story,” he says. “If they leave and eventually make a better decision later on based on their experience, that’s the real goal.

Progress starts small

For Whitaker, restaurants are one of the most powerful drivers of change. They connect people to food, farmers, and communities every single day. When those connections are intentional, they can quietly reshape how we eat, work, and grow.

“Restaurants are a medium of change for the world,” he says. “If you want to change a community, restaurants can actually do that in big ways.”

The goal has never been perfection. It’s progress that shapes the team, the business, and the community. By sharing recipes, experimenting in the ferment room, and inviting people into the process, Whitaker makes sustainability feel approachable rather than intimidating

For restaurants looking to get started, his advice is simple: start where it makes sense for your business. Source one local ingredient, like lettuce or grain, and build from there. Ask farmers what they need instead of assuming. Create demand where it matters.

Small decisions, made consistently and in strong collaborations with growers, can create a path for improved restaurant practices in meaningful ways.

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The 2026 James Beard Awards celebrated some of the most talented chefs and restaurants in the country. But beyond the accolades, acceptance speeches, and red-carpet moments, a clear message emerged about the future of hospitality.

This year’s nominees and winners spoke candidly about resilience, representation, kindness, and community—values that continue to shape the industry during a period of rapid change. While there was plenty of celebration throughout the evening, there was also a shared recognition that important work remains ahead. And as many guests reminded us throughout the weekend, that work is best done together.

From conversations on the red carpet to powerful moments on stage, here are our biggest takeaways from the 2026 James Beard Awards.

Resilience is an asset

In an industry defined by long hours, constant challenges, and ever-changing conditions, resilience emerged as a recurring theme among nominees and winners alike. Success wasn’t framed as overnight achievement, but as the result of years of persistence.

For chefs experiencing recognition on one of hospitality’s biggest stages, the focus remained firmly on the work itself.

“This is our second time around, it’s stressful but we can lean into it a little more and celebrate it!” said Vinnie Cimino, nominee Best Chef: Great Lakes. “Keep working, put your head down and believe in yourself—people make up the restaurants, find your community.”

“Don’t think about [winning]—hard work is recognized,” said Andrew Zimmern, presenter. “There will be people that deserve to be nominated, but will never be nominated—the goal should be looking after your restaurant, your people, your team.”

Diversity strengthens hospitality

During the awards speeches, many of the winners used their moment on stage to highlight the importance of representation in hospitality. Their stories reflected a broader shift in the industry: restaurants are increasingly becoming platforms for preserving culture, sharing lived experiences, and creating opportunities for future generations. For some, the journey here wasn’t easy—however, their win further proves the need for their voice, talent and their innovation.

“Even in moments of celebration, we’re reminded that our journey is different,” says Adrian Torres, winner Emerging Chef Award. “Tonight, the headline is that a kid from parents who sacrificed everything for the chance at a better life is standing on this stage accepting one of the highest honors in this industry.”

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Great careers are built over decades

For this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award, the acclaimed Nancy Silverton was the special honoree. While accepting the award, she reminded everyone that she’s not going anywhere—she’ll be back for her second Lifetime Achievement Award (at some point). On the red carpet, she gave some advice to chefs aspiring for their own lifetime achievement story.

“Look deep within and make sure it’s a career they want to give everything to,” said Silverton. “If the answer is yes, then everything else is easy—treat everyone with respect and work hard—even if the accolades don’t come, you still got to love what you do.”

Kindness matters

On top of working in a busy kitchen, every single one of these chefs also has busy lives. Through it all, these chefs are continuing to spread the message of kindness and patience through supportive work environments, open collaboration and empathy.

During Nok Suntaranon’s (Kalaya) memorable acceptance speech, she recounted the mission behind her restaurant, creating community and ultimately being a good person. This was echoed by many of the other chefs we spoke to throughout the night.

Community is the key

One of the strongest themes of the weekend wasn’t what happened on stage—it was what happened around it.

Throughout James Beard Awards weekend, we came together alongside restaurants, nonprofits, and hospitality organizations to celebrate one another and support important causes across the industry.

For the 5th Annual Black Food Folks event, we showed up with writers, journalists, advocates, and hospitality leaders to celebrate the 2026 James Beard Foundation Black finalists and honorees, while highlighting the work and impact they represent.

We also joined Ben’s Friends for an intimate industry luncheon at Swift & Sons, supporting the organization’s mission to provide community and resources for hospitality professionals navigating addiction and substance abuse challenges.

And at our annual Rosé Bowl at the Salt Shed, hospitality professionals from Chicago and across the country gathered to celebrate one another and honor Nancy Silverton’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

These events reinforced a simple but powerful truth: hospitality is at its best when people come together.

Congratulations to all of the 2026 James Beard Award winners.

Dylan Muñoz is our events correspondent — keeping you in the loop on chef-driven events across the world.

Hospitality is translation.

A guest asks one question, but a great restaurant learns to hear the question underneath it. The question before the question.

I learned this long before I understood hospitality. When I moved to the United States from the Philippines as a child, I had to learn English in about three months so I could go to school without being held back a year. At the time, translation didn’t feel poetic. It felt like survival.

I remember the itchiness of not fully understanding what was happening around me. The discomfort of almost getting it, but not quite. The anxiety of knowing there was a right answer somewhere, a social cue I was missing, a room I wanted to belong to, and language standing between me and that feeling.

When you’re a kid trying to understand a new country, translation isn’t just about words. It’s about tone, timing, body language, context, silence, and all the little things people mean but don’t say directly.

That experience shaped me long before I had language for it. I became very attuned to subtext. What is someone really asking? What do they need but don’t know how to say? What is the inner monologue underneath the sentence?

For a long time, that was a survival tactic. Somehow, through hospitality, it became a source of joy.

Anticipatory hospitality isn’t mind-reading. It isn’t just doing “extra.” It’s the operational discipline of recognizing what a guest is really asking for before they have to ask for it out loud. By the time someone has to ask to feel seen, comfortable, celebrated, relieved, safe, or understood, we’re already playing catch-up.

For years, hospitality has been described through the language of surprise and delight. I love surprise. I love delight. But I think the deeper work is quieter and harder to train: attention.

And attention can be trained. That’s the part I think we don’t talk about enough as an industry. The best hospitality doesn’t happen because one magical person on the floor “just gets it.” It happens because an entire culture has been taught what to look for, how to listen, when to move, and when to get out of the way. It comes from reservation notes, pre-shift, body language, emotional intelligence, managers modeling what matters, and giving the team permission to act.

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It comes from understanding that “yes” isn’t just an answer. It’s a posture.

A few seasons ago, our team started serving scented warm towels as part of the experience at one of our restaurants. On paper, that sounds like a small detail. A towel. A scent. A moment between courses. But it was never really about the towel.

It started with a bigger question: What does it feel like when a guest is truly allowed to arrive? Not just physically, but emotionally. What would help someone transition from traffic, inboxes, childcare logistics, work stress, or whatever else they carried through the door into the world we were trying to build for them?

We weren’t trying to invent a luxury flourish. We were trying to answer a need before anyone had to name it. That, to me, is where hospitality really lives.

• When someone asks, “How long does the tasting menu take?” they may not only be asking for a number of minutes. They may be asking, “Can I trust you with my time?”

• When someone asks, “Is this wine worth it?” they may really be asking, “Will you help me feel confident instead of exposed?”

• When someone asks for a quieter table, they may be asking, “Can I actually connect with the person I came here with?”

• When someone says, “I don’t know anything about wine,” they may be asking, “Do I still belong in this conversation?”

• When someone says, “We’re celebrating,” they may be asking, “Do you understand that this night means something to me?”

Many times, guests are trying to tell us exactly what they want. It just hasn’t been translated yet.

That is where we come in.

The mistake is thinking anticipatory hospitality is always grand. Sometimes it’s invisible. It’s seating someone away from the speaker because a reservation note mentioned their father is hard of hearing. It’s pacing a table differently because they told the host they have theater tickets, even if they haven’t reminded the server yet. It’s knowing when a birthday wants candles and sparkle, and when it wants privacy and a perfect glass of Champagne. It’s noticing the guest who keeps saying “we’re fine” but has stopped making eye contact with you.

Some of the most meaningful hospitality never announces itself. It simply removes friction.

And when friction disappears, the guest often cannot point to exactly why the night felt so good. They just know they relaxed. They trusted the room. They felt held.

That’s not an accident. That’s operations.

There are also certain questions that tell me when we were too late. They are diagnostic questions, not something to shame a team with. They show us where the guest had to step outside the experience and start managing their own comfort.

• “May I have some water?” is one of them. Water should be one of the first acts of welcome. It says, “We see that you have arrived, and we are already taking care of you.”

• “Can we order?” tells us the table is now driving the experience.

• “Is our food coming soon?” tells us the pacing has become unclear.

• “Can we get share plates?” tells us the food arrived without the tools to enjoy it.

• “May I have coffee?” can be another missed cue. The end of the meal deserves as much care as the beginning. Coffee, tea, a final drink, or simply the offer of a closing moment should arrive before a guest has to construct their own ending.

• “Can someone run my card?” tells us the goodbye has gotten stuck in administrative purgatory, which is a tragedy because the last five minutes can absolutely undo the previous two hours.

• And “Did you forget about us?” is the sentence every operator feels in their bones. At that point, the guest is not just waiting. They feel abandoned.

The goal isn’t perfection. Restaurants are living things, full of humans taking care of humans, which means even on our best days, something will go sideways. But these questions matter because they tell us where anticipation and communication broke down. They remind us that a guest should not have to project-manage their own comfort.

Every time a guest has to ask for something foundational, they are briefly pulled out of the magic and into management. Our job is to keep them in the experience.

Here are a few translations I think about often:

1. “Can we order slowly?” usually means, “Will you let this night unfold?”
The solution is not to disappear. It is to adjust the rhythm. Stay present, but don’t rush the plot. Great pacing is hospitality with good editing.

2. “What do you recommend?” usually means, “Will you help me make a good decision?”
This is where vague enthusiasm fails. “Everything is great” may be kind, but it is not useful. A real recommendation builds trust because it tells the guest, “I am willing to guide you.”

3. “Is this enough food?” usually means, “Will you protect me from doing this wrong?”
Menus can create anxiety. Our job is to make ordering feel easy. The guest should never feel foolish for needing help understanding portioning, pacing, or how the experience works.

4. “Do you have anything less expensive?” usually means, “Can you protect my budget without making it weird?”
Money is emotional. Wine especially can make people feel vulnerable. When we talk about price with ease and respect, we give guests dignity. A great value should be presented with as much pride as the trophy bottle.

5. “I have an allergy” means exactly what it says, and also, “Can I trust you to take care of me?”
This is one of the clearest places where hospitality becomes a responsibility. Repeat it back. Communicate it clearly. Slow the moment down. Confidence matters because safety matters.

6. “I don’t want to be a bother” usually means, “Am I allowed to need something?”
This one breaks my heart a little because the answer should always be yes. You are not a bother. This is what we are here for.

7. Silence can mean, “Does anyone notice me?”
The loudest guest is not always the guest most in need of care. Sometimes the most important table in the room is the one that has stopped asking.

The Hospitality Translations Playbook

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In a time when the industry is rightly thinking about efficiency, technology, staffing, and sustainability, I hope we do not lose sight of the oldest and most powerful tool we have: human attention.

Technology can help us remember. Systems can help us execute. Notes can help us prepare. But hospitality still happens in the translation.

It happens when a guest gives us a sentence, a glance, a hesitation, a celebration, a worry, a tiny clue, and we respond not only to what they said, but to what they meant.

The question before the question is usually simple.

Do you see me?
Can I trust you?
Do I belong here?
Will you help me feel like myself?

A great restaurant answers yes before the guest has to ask.

Author Bio:
June Rodil is the CEO and Partner of Goodnight Hospitality, the Houston-based group behind MARCH, Rosie Cannonball, The Marigold Club, and Montrose Cheese & Wine. One of approximately 29 women in the Americas to hold the Master Sommelier credential, she is the only person in Food & Wine history to earn both Sommelier of the Year and Restaurants of the year honors, a distinction that speaks to the standard of excellence she brings to every concept in the Goodnight Hospitality portfolio.

The author serves on OpenTable’s ambassador council and is compensated for this role. Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the author are solely that of the author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

The Utility Show in Chicago is only a few years old, but it already has a way of cutting through the noise to get to the heart of what the industry needs. It’s a time for operators, hospitality leaders, and technology partners to have the conversations the industry actually needs.

OpenTable was there to listen and to show what we’ve been building in response to the challenges restaurants are trying to solve. Inside the OpenTable Test Kitchen, operators got a first look at some of the AI-powered tools we’re building to surface insights in a conversational way, optimize availability automatically, and help teams stay responsive without losing the human touch. We also brought in PolyAI to show how voice AI fits into a seamless guest experience.

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But what stayed with us from the two days had less to do with any single product and more to do with what kept surfacing in the panel discussions, restaurant pitches, and conversations on the show floor.

Food as language

Ope Amosu, founder of ChòpnBlọk and the Utility Show pitch competition winner, didn’t just talk about food. He talked about West African culture, about accessibility, about meeting people where they are—and about continuing to feed minds through storytelling long after the meal is over.

That message came up repeatedly. Restaurants are expressions of something—a neighborhood, a culture, a point of view. Everything from the menus to the music to the way a host greets a guest is communicating a message. And that’s the context in which restaurant technology has to earn its place. Tools that free up time create more space for a restaurant to tell its story.

The weight of running a restaurant

The chefs, operators, and owners who spoke at the Utility Show have made payroll during a pandemic, rebuilt teams from scratch, navigated cost pressures, and more. But what we kept hearing wasn’t complaint—it was clear-eyed determination.

“We need to be in the business of making sure our communities are protected,” said Erick Williams, Chef & Owner of Virtue Hospitality Group, during a panel discussion on why being an independent restaurant doesn’t mean being alone.

That conversation extended into something actionable: how independent operators can find and use their collective voice. Panelists pointed to the Independent Restaurant Coalition as a model for what advocacy looks like in practice. The message was consistent: the challenges are real, but so is the community, and operators who engage with it are better positioned to weather what comes next.

Human, first—always

The best operators know that hospitality isn’t just a guest-facing practice. It shows up in how they run a pre-shift meeting, how they check in with a server who is having a hard night, how honest they are with their teams and what’s working and what isn’t. As one operator put it simply, “Hospitality is a team sport.”

That throughline between team culture and guest experience came up over and over again—and it’s the standard we hold our own tools to at OpenTable. Operators aren’t looking for technology that removes the human touch. They’re looking for more time and better information so their teams can do what they do best: make people feel taken care of.

Technology should always be in service of that. Never a substitute for it.

What we’re taking back

The conversations didn’t stop when the sessions did. Even at a Bruno Mars concert alongside Square and a group of restaurant partners, then and at OpenTable’s reception for hospitality leaders at José Andrés’ Bazaar Meat, the talk kept coming back to the industry, to the work, to what comes next.

We left Chicago with a sharper sense of what operators need from us next, and a clear understanding of why it matters.

Every restaurant makes a thousand small decisions a day.

What goes on the menu. Where ingredients come from. How prep gets done. What gets used—and how waste is handled.

It’s in those small, repeatable choices that sustainability in restaurants takes shape.

So we went straight to the expert. We sat down with Edward Lee, chef and owner of SHIA, to understand what sustainability looks like in practice on the floor and in the kitchen—what works, what doesn’t, and where it can make a real impact on business.

Read on to learn more about how Edward Lee brings sustainability to the forefront of his business.With a free subscription, you’re helping in supporting the stories chefs across the world.

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For those who may not know SHIA Restaurant, can you tell us a bit about it and what led you to focus on sustainability?

SHIA is a non-profit restaurant located in Washington, DC that focuses on three main pillars of sustainability: zero plastics, zero gas and waste reduction. We operate as a modern Korean fine dining restaurant.

When you talk about sustainability in your restaurant, what does that actually look like in your day-to-day operations?

Being a zero-plastic restaurant, we are always aware of the tools and equipment around us everyday. We find alternative methods for storage and cooking techniques that do not utilize single or limited-use plastics. We also track our energy usage daily so we adapt our cooking to make sure we are being as energy efficient as possible. We do not keep our ovens on all day long, we target the times we need them on during prep and try to get all the oven cooking done at once to maximize our cooking using as little energy as possible.

If another restaurant wanted to start improving sustainability tomorrow, what are the first three things you’d tell them to look at?

Replace the plastics in your kitchen that are the easiest solutions—cutting boards, pens, gloves. Then tackle the more difficult ones like storage containers, cling wrap, etc. Reduce waste by utilizing every part of a protein or vegetable. And lastly, ask your purveyors to reduce the amount of plastic that your deliveries are wrapped in.

What’s worked when it comes to getting your team on board and building lasting habits?

Consistency is key. When you go zero plastic, it is really easy to forget and let some small plastic items creep into your kitchen unnoticed. It is really important to just have a zero tolerance policy and to enforce it so there is no debating whether or not this item can get a pass. But the one thing we always do is allow ourselves time to adjust so it isn’t a huge inconvenience that sacrifices the quality of the food.

What’s one misconception about running a sustainable restaurant you want to clear up?

That it is too expensive. That is usually the first thing that I hear. It is more expensive but most people greatly exaggerate the costs. This past year, we tracked all the extra expenses that it took to run a zero-plastic restaurant, and we decided we would raise the price of our tasting menu to cover those extra costs. It ended up that we only had to raise our menu price by $2 per person. That is a cost that customers would be more than willing to pay.

What are the easiest “first wins” you’ve seen when it comes to removing single-use plastic?

The easy ones were plastic cutting boards, all equipment with plastic handles like knives and spatulas, using natural fiber sponges versus ones that contain plastic, and using organic material gloves versus plastic ones. Once you see how easy it is, you become curious about finding alternatives to every other aspect in your kitchen.

How have these changes impacted your operating costs—either immediately or over time?

They cost more [upfront] but not much over time. Once you realize that the replacement items are more durable and last much longer than plastic options, you realize that over time, the costs come down to the point where you actually may be saving money by not having to constantly reorder plastic items.

Where have you seen efficiency improvements as a result of the changes you’ve made?

We understand that cooking is a cooperative practice. So for example, three different chefs may have to roast something in the oven. In the past, the oven would be on all day long and each chef would just use the oven when it was convenient during the day’s prep. Now we speak to each other and coordinate our oven times so that we can be roasting three or four items at the same time to best use the oven’s energy. We save energy by not having the oven on all day, the kitchen is cooler so it is a nicer environment to work in and we finish our prep faster because we are being more efficient.

What surprised you most about the operational impact of making these changes?

It has made us all better chefs. It has pushed us to be more aware and more present in our kitchen. When we use glass containers instead of plastic, we cannot drop it or else it is a major clean up. You would think that would slow us down but instead it has made us more focused in every aspect of our day. We cannot cook absentmindedly. It is a really lovely kitchen to walk into. You feel more connected to a purpose and an environment without plastic just makes us all feel better.

If a restaurant could only make one change in the next 30 days, what would you recommend?

Start small. Just look around at the items you can easily replace: pens, clipboards, soap dispensers, even aprons (many contain plastic fibers). Celebrate the small wins and then over time, see what else you can eliminate. Don’t feel like you have to do 100% plastic free. If over the next year, you can go 25% plastic free, that is a massive win. If every restaurant in America reduced single use plastic by just 15%, that is mountains of plastic that we are not contributing to planet Earth.

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Restaurants are businesses. But that description alone limits their capacity. A restaurant is also a message.

Every choice communicates something: the lighting, the music, the way a host greets someone at the door, the way a cook finishes a plate before it leaves the pass. Even the distance between tables speaks to how we believe people should gather. Guests may come for dinner, but what they experience is culture. That applies whether you run a café, a neighborhood spot, or a fine dining restaurant. The concept may change; the responsibility does not.

When I opened Virtue in Chicago, my goal was specific. I wanted to challenge the confusion surrounding Southern food traditions and remind people of the care that sits at the center of hospitality.

It is the small, intentional-yet-spontaneous acts of kindness that reinforce to a guest that they matter. Genuine hospitality begins the moment we meet you, not when the food and drinks arrive.

That principle guides how we operate across all of our restaurants. The cooking matters deeply, but it is only one part of the experience. The real work is demonstrating care through every interaction in the room. Restaurants do not become meaningful by accident. They become meaningful when operators are clear about what they stand for.

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Clarity is the operator’s greatest asset.

Successful businesses create and apply solutions for their customers. As AI and automation continue to reshape our world, the craving for human interaction, original thought, compassion, and genuine empathy will only increase. This is where restaurants hold their ground. Hospitals diagnose, treat, and repair the body. Restaurants have the opportunity to do something just as important for the soul.

We are in the business of hospitality. That is a human-to-human connection that no software can replace. When a restaurant is dialed in, it offers more than food. It offers a safe space—a reset, comfort, and care in a way that cannot be reproduced through automation. Operators who understand this work differently. They are not just serving meals; they are creating spaces where people feel something. And that changes the standard.

Our industry constantly chases trends. One year it is tasting menus; the next it is QR codes, automation, or whatever promises to fix the bottom line. Some of those tools help, but none of them answer the most important question: What are you actually trying to say? The answer will be different for every restaurant. It may come from culture, family, or personal experience. The source matters less than the clarity. Guests can feel when a restaurant knows who it is.

To achieve this, culture must be defined. Culture is never the playlist or the décor—those are expressions. Culture is behavior. It is what a team practices every day. It is what people protect when the room is full and the pressure is high.

In our restaurants, that culture shows up in a few specific ways:

• Care is the standard. Not scripted care—real care. The host who welcomes someone as if they belong. The server who listens. The cook who prepares a plate with intention. Guests may forget a dish. They rarely forget how they were treated.

• Craft is non-negotiable. Cooking is a craft. Service is a craft. Running a restaurant well is a craft. That means discipline, repetition, and a respect for details most people never notice. Every plate matters. Every table matters.

• Team is everything. Restaurants are team sports. No single person creates the experience. High standards are necessary, and respect is non-negotiable. People perform at their best when they are valued.

We often talk about the difference between pressure and purpose. Pressure can come from chaos or an intense desire to be the best. Purpose comes from clarity about why you do what you do—and the impact it has on someone beyond yourself.

Impact matters. Restaurants shape neighborhoods. They create opportunity. They carry traditions forward. At their best, they become places where people, culture, and opportunity intersect. When culture is clear, everything else becomes possible. Consistency becomes achievable. Standards become repeatable. Growth becomes sustainable.

Clarity scales. Confusion does not.

Technology will change. Labor models will evolve. Guests will have more choices than ever before. But the purpose of a restaurant will remain the same. A restaurant is a place where people gather—one of the few spaces left where strangers sit near each other, share food, and participate in something that cannot be reproduced on a screen. That care has value beyond the check.

A restaurant should feed people well, support the people who work inside it, and reflect the operator’s clear point of view about hospitality and community. When those things align, something powerful happens. The restaurant becomes much more than a place to eat. It becomes a real part of people’s lives—the place where they share experiences, reconnect, and return to.

That is the real opportunity in this work: to build a place that matters. And when a restaurant matters, people protect it. That kind of meaning does not happen by accident. It comes from clarity—clarity of purpose, clarity of culture, and clarity of care.

Clarity is the operator’s greatest asset.

Erick Williams is a James Beard Award-winning chef and the restaurateur behind Virtue Restaurant in Chicago. Known for his refined take on Southern cuisine, he champions community, mentorship, and equity in hospitality, and is a leading voice shaping modern dining.

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The author serves on OpenTable’s advisory board and is compensated for this role. Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

Success for small, independent restaurants often comes down to one thing: how deeply you can weave your business into the local community. Chef Jordan Rubin and his wife, Marisa, of Mr. Tuna have mastered this “community-first” approach. What started as a mobile sushi cart in 2017 is now a brick-and-mortar Portland mainstay, built on hyper-local sourcing and a steady cadence of collaboration.

Rubin has spent more than 25 years working in kitchens—the majority of that time in sushi restaurants.

In a city like Portland, that experience has translated into a long-standing commitment to serving the community the best way he knows how: through food.

“[Portland’s] restaurants are what makes it so unique here,” says Rubin. “Almost all of the restaurants here are chef/family-owned.”

Chef collaborations as a business strategy

That mindset is part of what led Rubin to launch Tuna & Friends—a dining series where chefs from around the country are invited to collaborate, explore and experience why Portland has an undeniably exceptional food culture.

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“Part of the business model [of Mr. Tuna] is the collaborations and pop-ups over the years,” says Rubin. “We’re bringing chefs to Mr. Tuna and having them use our locally-sourced and sustainable seafood to come up with a menu highlighting their specific style.”

The goal is to create something new for guests while exposing visiting chefs to the local vendors and suppliers that make it possible. As part of the experience, chefs tour Portland’s working waterfront, getting up close to the product they’ll be using during the collaboration.

These events not only educate others and keep the menu fresh—they give guests a reason to come back and bring new diners through the door.

Local sourcing as a competitive edge

Sustainable fishing and working with local vendors have played an important role in how Rubin has shaped his business. He champions community engagement and education on sustainability, while encouraging curiosity in doing one’s own research.

“There’s a lot of great work being done out there, and not a lot of people know about it,” says Rubin. “There are so many perspectives…it’s hard to know what’s actually right.”

“We shouldn’t just assume what’s good for the environment, we need to do the research to be sure.”

Rubin consistently pushes for greater care in how we treat our waters and is attuned to growing concerns around how they are managed. He encourages restaurants to buy local when they can—prioritizing local fisheries that uphold sustainable fishing practices.

Rubin sees port cities as not only vital to the surrounding area, but beyond.

“Having access is key in terms of sourcing,” says Rubin. “Sometimes restaurants in port cities don’t even have the same access as others for a variety of reasons.”

That’s why building relationships with a diverse group of vendors is so important to him. By connecting with suppliers and chefs in other coastal cities, restaurants can support one another while expanding their reach.

“For example: one chef in Georgia might have access to water, but not be able to fish due to pollution, restrictions, etc.” says Rubin. “By having a connection in another coastal city like Portland, we’re able to grow our local economy and support a small business elsewhere.”

Mr. Tuna sources from a variety of suppliers, including Bangs Mussels (pictured above) located in Portland, American Unagi and Upstream—partners Rubin has worked with for some time. “There’s definitely a sense of community here when it comes to our fish,” says Rubin. “We’re very intertwined and proud to be connected to the seafood business.” Like bread and butter, the restaurant business and seafood business go hand-in-hand in places like Portland.

Building something people want to come back to

If there’s one thing that Rubin has learned over the years, it’s that his love for hosting has only increased.

“I’ve created a space where I can host, feed and connect people in my community,” says Rubin. “Restaurants matter to so many people and having the creative freedom to do whatever I want in this space, for those same, passionate people—it’s really cool.”

Mr. Tuna’s Tuna & Friends dinner series runs until June 3, 2026. To learn more about the series click here.

Just last weekend, OpenTable was at Ojai Food & Wine Festival at the beautiful Ojai Valley Inn, in you guessed it — Ojai, California. This event brings together some of the industry’s best and brightest chefs and personalities for an unforgettable weekend of Michelin-level dining, expertly crafted wine tastings and candid conversations.

Beyond the the delicious food, guests also had the chance to hear directly from the chefs themselves during an array of intimate panel discussions. These conversations highlighted topics like: the limits of unreasonable hospitality, culinary treasures of the California coast and the real stories behind the hit Netflix series, Chef’s Table. Read on to get the full rundown of the weekends best highlights.

Opening reception & grand tasting

As per tradition, the festival kicked off—and wrapped up—with a grand tasting experience where the chefs showcased a show-stopping dish for guests to enjoy.

Nancy Silverton brought a spread of different desserts from her cookbook, The Cookie That Changed My Life, including her famous ultra-nutty peanut butter cookie. Other stations included dishes from Daisy Ryan (Bell’s), Jon Yao (Kato), Hillary Sterling (Ci Ciamo), Vijay Kumar (Semma) and more.

Panel discussions, cooking demos, wine pairings…

A big draw for guests was the opportunity to sit down with some of the chefs and hospitality leaders and and get to the nitty gritty of what it really takes to build and sustain a successful career in the restaurant industry.

On Friday, Will Guidara (formerly Eleven Madison Park) sat down with famed food critic Ruth Reichl to discuss his book Unreasonable Hospitality and the legacy behind the concept. Guidara spoke on what it means to provide an unforgettable dining for guests. He harked back to one of his favorite meals at Four Seasons’ Brasserie. For Guidara, hospitality isn’t simply about the product, it’s about the people. He encouraged chefs to systemize graciousness and allow for a free flow of ideas that aren’t coming just from “the top,” and to provide resources so staff can actually give unreasonable hospitality.

“Too often we don’t do what’s right by a vast majority of people because we are afraid of what’s going to go bad for a select few” — Will Guidara.

Saturday’s panel featured talent from the hit Netflix series Chef’s Table and touched on the realities of running a kitchen while filming a television show on a tight production schedule. Executive producer Brian McGinn noted many challenges in narrowing down a storyline for the episode — mentioning how important it was to tell the right story, not just a story. Things got emotional when “Nok” Suntaranon (Kalaya) reflected on her episode, which featured a surprise appearance from her mother. Family ties played a big part in what made these episodes so impactful, with Chris Bianco (Pizzeria Bianco) sharing heartfelt memories of his relationship with his late father.

At another seminar, the Bryant Family of winemakers discussed the longevity of the wine industry with the overarching question: “Does Gen-Z care enough about wine?”. The group discussed how shifting consumer habits, rising costs, and accessibility challenges are influencing how younger generations consume wine. At the same time, they noted that demand remains strong in Southern Europe, while French blends have made a big impact in regions like East and South-East Asia.

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Dining experiences

Of course, a big part of what makes Ojai Food & Wine Festival so special is the unique dining experiences offered by the talented chefs. This year, the event featured private lunches and dinners hosted by restaurants across the U.S. like Semma (NYC), Gramercy Tavern (NYC) and chef collaborations such as the Ambassade Dinner hosted by William Bradley (Addison), Matthew Kammerer (Habor House Inn), Justin Cogley (Aubergine) and Cassidee Dabney (The Barn at Blackberry Farm).

Shift Drink

A highlight of the weekend was Shift Drink, an after-hours event that took place on Saturday before the final grand tasting on Sunday. It gave guests a chance to unwind after a long weekend of cooking and tasting—and to connect with fellow chefs and restaurateurs.

Dylan Muñoz is our events correspondent — keeping you in the loop on chef-driven events across the world.

At my first restaurant job when I was a teenager, the first task I learned was how to make a shallot vinaigrette. I would make a gallon of it and pour it into several plastic squeeze bottles in anticipation of the dozens of salads I would dress that night. We had many squeeze bottles in that restaurant, and I learned to smell each one before adding the vinaigrette because the residual odors always lingered—and you didn’t want to put vinaigrette into a squeeze bottle that smelled like chocolate sauce.

Over the next three decades, I worked in many kitchens and developed countless recipes. In almost every aspect of the restaurant industry, innovation and technology have streamlined work and improved the equipment we use. And yet, in almost every kitchen you walk into today, you will still see the same ubiquitous plastic squeeze bottle on the kitchen line.

And it’s not just plastic squeeze bottles. In every corner of a modern restaurant kitchen,

disposable plastic items are everywhere—from deli quart containers and cling wrap to plastic cutting boards, tasting spoons, and so much more. Over the years, I have seen our reliance on these single-use plastic wares grow to levels that are impossible to ignore. It has led me to question how I run my kitchen—and ultimately inspired the Zero Plastic Initiative at SHIA Restaurant in Washington D.C.

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The spark: Awareness through a viral video

For a long time, plastic in kitchens felt invisible. It was just part of the job and the rhythm of service. Then a moment outside the kitchen forced me, and many others to see it differently: a video of a turtle with a plastic straw stuck in its nose went viral. It prompted many restaurants and bars across the country to ban plastic straws. It was an effective movement and the start of wider awareness about how disposable plastics end up in our environment, harming our landscape, our oceans, and eventually ourselves.

Though reducing plastic straws was a step in the right direction, I was dismayed to realize it was only a drop in the bucket compared to how much plastics exist in our kitchens. While I won’t go into a deep dive on the science of microplastics, there is growing evidence of the impact of microplastics on our own health. We are only beginning to scratch the surface around how harmful plastics can be, and I truly believe that this is one of the most urgent environmental issues of our time.

A chef’s responsibility

As a lifelong chef and restaurateur, I feel it is my responsibility to be a part of the solution rather than a contributor to the problem.

But this effort only works if it’s collective. Real change will come from restaurants and chefs working together—not from a handful of outliers trying to do everything perfectly.

That’s why SHIA operates as a Zero Plastic non-profit restaurant. For the past year, we’ve been doing the work: collecting data, tracking costs, and researching practical alternatives to disposable and limited-use plastics in a real, working kitchen. Our goal isn’t to stand on a pedestal—it’s to make it easier for other restaurants to reduce their plastic reliance. A few Zero Plastic restaurants won’t move the needle. What will make a difference is hundreds or even thousands of restaurants reducing plastics by small percentages.

Our first annual report is designed as a checklist. Restaurateurs can go down the list and check off what they are willing to change. It’s not meant to lecture restaurant owners how to run their businesses. We simply want to inspire people by doing the work and sharing what we learn—freely and transparently.

The three biggest obstacles

When I talk to other chefs about reducing plastics, I hear the same the three main obstacles:

• Time: They don’t have the time to research effective alternatives.

• Energy: They don’t have the bandwidth to put the new policies and training models in place.

• Cost: They don’t have the extra funds to absorb the expenses of going plastic-free.

Our research aims to take the guesswork out of the first two obstacles. Regarding cost, we are testing out a theory to see if diners will be willing to absorb an increase in prices to offset the cost of going plastic-free.

I still remember being a young chef in a kitchen in NYC and seeing for the first time, a farmer peek in through the back door and ask if we were interested in purchasing organic vegetables. My boss and chef at the time replied “Why would I pay double for a carrot?” That was sort of the prevailing wisdom when organic produce first hit the open market. What my chef at the time and many others missed was that there was a massive group of consumers that were willing to pay more for organic produce and meats to ensure better taste and better health. Today, organic vegetables are commonplace, and knowing where your ingredients come from is not niche, it is expected.

Our question that we are working to answer is: Is Zero Plastic the new organic vegetable?

Quantifying costs for practical solutions

If we can answer that question and prove that consumers are willing to absorb the cost, then we may eliminate the major obstacles to going plastic-free. In order to do this, we’ve spent the last year tracking the actual costs of eliminating disposable and limited-use plastics at SHIA. By documenting every expense, we’re able to share what it costs to operate a restaurant that is 100% free of disposable plastics—and how that cost may translate to menu pricing. For other restaurants, this creates a clear, practical roadmap for reducing plastic without guesswork.

Read the full report

Beyond the numbers: The mental shift

This work is not just a numbers game. One of the most significant byproducts of going

plastic-free has been the shift in attitude and mental health in SHIA’s kitchen. I did not realize how much it affected my psyche to be surrounded by so much plastic until I got rid of it in my kitchen. There is something undeniably refreshing and beautiful about working in a kitchen that is filled with permanent, durable, and high-quality products.

This approach has also fostered more focus, care, and presence across our team. If we drop a glass container full of beans, we know it will shatter, and the mess and loss of product will be extreme. As a result, the chef team moves with more intention. Yes, things do take a little more time and may cost more—but the benefits of how it has changed our attitude towards food and our connection to the environment around us are immeasurable.

Once I experienced the shift, it was impossible for me to go back to a world full of disposable plastics again. Ultimately, my mission now is to share this uplifting experience—and the data behind it—with as many people who want to be part of this necessary movement.

Author Bio:

Edward Lee is a chef, author, and restaurateur known for blending Southern flavors with global influences. As founder of SHIA Restaurant in Washington, D.C., he champions sustainability and culinary innovation. A James Beard Award semifinalist and Top Chef alum, he appears frequently in print and on television, including earning an Emmy nomination for his role in the Emmy Award–winning series The Mind of a Chef.

Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

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Restaurants are living organisms. They grow, adapt, and respond to the world around them. To stay relevant is not about chasing constant reinvention, but about remaining attentive to time, to place, and to purpose.

In my experience, reinvention is rarely a dramatic overhaul. More often, it is a quiet evolution. A slow refinement. A deepening of what already exists. Staying true to yourself while allowing the work to mature.

At Atelier Crenn, evolution has never meant abandoning who we are. It has meant listening more closely to our craft, our values, and the rhythm of the seasons.

The Foundation of Craft

Creativity does not exist without structure. True freedom in the kitchen comes from mastery of fundamentals. Technique is not restrictive; it is what allows expression to endure.

One of the most essential foundations of our cooking is sauce-making. Sauce is memory. It is patience. It is discipline. Long before a dish becomes poetic, it must be precise. A sauce carries the depth of a kitchen—its understanding of balance, restraint, and intention. It connects ingredients to emotion.

Atelier Crenn’s cuisine may appear light, modern, and minimal, but it is built on classical technique. Stocks reduced slowly. Emulsions carefully balanced. Flavors layered with purpose. These fundamentals are not always visible on the plate, but they are always present. They are what give a dish its soul.

Innovation without craft is fragile. Craft without creativity is static. The dialogue between the two is where longevity lives.

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Evolution, Not Overhaul

Atelier Crenn has evolved significantly since its early days, in form, in structure, in technique. But our core has remained the same: a poetic expression of nature, memory, and sustainability. The menu is not a list of dishes; it is a narrative. Each season, we rewrite that story.

Rewriting does not mean erasing. It means refining language. Clarifying intention. Allowing new chapters to emerge naturally.

There is often pressure in our industry to change quickly, to constantly present something “new.” But relevance does not require constant disruption. Sometimes the most meaningful evolution is subtle—a shift in proportion, a new interpretation of a familiar preparation, a sauce that speaks more clearly than it did before.

Staying true to yourself requires patience. It requires confidence in your identity and trust in your process.

Creativity Rooted in Restraint

Our creative process begins not with trends, but with questions: Why does this dish exist? What story does it tell? What does it honor?

These questions guide every decision, from sourcing to technique to presentation. Creativity is not about excess. It is about clarity.

Often, innovation comes from simplifying and stripping a dish back to its essence until only what matters remains. That discipline allows creativity to feel honest rather than performative.

Sauce becomes a metaphor here. A great sauce does not demand attention. It supports, connects, and elevates. It brings harmony to a dish without overshadowing its elements. The same is true of thoughtful reinvention.

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Global Influence, Personal Interpretation

We live in a global culinary world, where inspiration travels freely and ideas cross borders effortlessly.

I believe deeply in learning from other cultures, other crafts, and other perspectives. But influence must always pass through a personal lens.

For me, that lens is shaped by my upbringing in France, my life in California, and a deep commitment to sustainability and ethics. Global ideas become meaningful only when they are interpreted, not replicated.

Reinvention does not come from imitation. It comes from translation. From asking how a technique, an ingredient, or an idea fits into your world and values.

Time, Team, and Trust

Reinvention is not a solitary act. It happens through dialogue—within a kitchen, within a team, within a community.

Atelier Crenn’s evolution is shaped by the people who cook alongside me every day. Curiosity is encouraged. Fundamentals are respected. Ideas are tested slowly and thoughtfully.

Leadership, to me, is about creating an environment where rigor and imagination coexist. Where a young cook learns the discipline of sauce-making with the same seriousness as plating. Where innovation grows from shared knowledge.

Time is essential. Some ideas need seasons, even years, to fully reveal themselves. That patience is part of the craft.

Relevance as Integrity

The world is changing—environmentally, culturally, socially. Restaurants do not exist outside of that reality. Staying relevant means responding with integrity.

Sustainability is not a trend; it is a responsibility that shapes how we cook, source, and think. Creativity today must be conscious. Craft must be ethical.

Reinvention, then, becomes less about reinvention at all and more about alignment. Aligning what we do with what we believe.

For restaurants at any stage, relevance comes from honoring fundamentals, evolving slowly, and remaining grounded in purpose. At its best, a restaurant grows not by losing itself, but by becoming more fully what it has always been.

Author Bio:
Dominique Crenn is the chef and owner of Atelier Crenn in San Francisco, the first restaurant in the United States to earn three MICHELIN stars under a female chef. Her work blends classical technique, poetic storytelling, and a deep commitment to sustainability and craft.

Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

Show Them That You Care: Hospitality Starts Within

In a recent issue of OpenTable’s Notes From the Table, Andrew Zimmern reminded us that even during difficult times, the hospitality industry pivots, changes, and adapts to difficult circumstances because we are driven toward our passion of taking care of people—our guests, our community, our teams. What I have learned over time is the importance of taking care of that last group—our own team members. No restaurant is possible without the team behind it, and how we make that team feel valued is the most important driver of culture. As Maya Angelou said, “…people never forget how you made them feel.”

Belonging starts at work

Feeling valued creates a sense of belonging, which has been a large part of my personal journey. As a teenager in a largely non-Asian community, I always sought that sense of belonging. I found it in an unlikely place—a French restaurant around the corner from my home. Even though the food was extremely unfamiliar, I felt part of something meaningful. Being part of that team creating memorable experiences for our guests launched my confidence and transformed me from an awkward 16-year-old to a valued bus person, bartender, server, and eventually, restaurateur. When people feel they matter, they perform differently— not just for their guests, but for each other.

Image credit: Ellen Yin

The industry has changed. And so must we.

Over the past decade and up through today, finding qualified candidates has become increasingly challenging. Our teams and those entering the industry are very different than they were even before and after the pandemic. For all service industries—people are its most important asset and if the asset becomes scarce, the business needs to change.

First, it’s not just about recruitment—it’s retention. It’s not enough to bring someone in—we need to keep them by ensuring that sense of belonging, providing strong training and offering clear career development programs. For High Street Hospitality Group, that has included becoming part of the National Restaurant Association’s manager apprenticeship training, offering ServSafe courses to every team member, providing stipends for wine education, subsidizing accounting & HR certifications, to name a few. But even with these tools, connecting with each team member and meeting them where they are at is essential to provide a nurturing environment.

Our industry also must accept that quality of life and financial stability matter. It is no longer a badge of honor to work two doubles, six days straight. We need to look at the long hours, unpredictable schedules and consistency of pay, which for some team members, may be even more important than traditional benefits. There is no one size fits all. We need to understand what our team members want and shift to ensure a more sustainable, attractive and supportive environment for our team members—all the while ensuring our own financial stability.

Modeling internal hospitality

The growing importance of our teams and internal culture is why some of the country’s leading restaurateurs have pivoted their guest-facing hospitality philosophies inward, placing equal (if not more) value on internal hospitality. After all, we ask our teams to deliver exceptional hospitality—but have we made sure they’ve felt it themselves? And, if they don’t feel supported, valued, and empowered, can they be their best amid the daily pressures of a busy restaurant?

As visionary Danny Meyer, founder of Union Square Hospitality Group, holds in his Enlightened Hospitality philosophy, all stakeholders including team members should be held in equal regard. At its core, internal hospitality means treating your team with the same hospitality you show your guests. By doing so, we create a work environment where people feel supported, respected, and valued. One disengaged employee can cost more than an unhappy guest—through training dollars, the cost of recruitment, disrupted service, and lowered morale. On the other hand, a team member who feels seen and appreciated performs at a higher level and inspires those around them. When that spirit is shared across the team, it becomes a culture of care—an undeniable competitive advantage that no one can replicate.

Image credit: Ellen Yin

What this looks like in practice

Not every small business can afford health insurance, retirement plans, etc. but every business can start with the simple strategies below without spending a penny. After all, hospitality is free.

Communicate consistently and transparently with your team.

It is as simple as a conversation. I used to be afraid to have check-ins because I feared that there might be unfixable things, issues that cost a lot of money to fix, or worse yet, things I might have to change about myself! As I’ve grown, I’ve come to value that feedback and look forward to spending time with all levels of the organization, whether through one-on-one check-ins, group lunches, etc.

Set clear expectations from both sides.

Make sure your handbook spells out your mission, vision and the culture you are trying to create—then consistently communicate and enforce it. Although we are in a digital world, memorializing it on paper creates a formal expectation of what both parties want and need. In addition to our handbook, we prioritize onboarding to ensure all new team members understand our culture through an in-person orientation where we actively discuss the meaning of our value system.

Recognize and reward the positives.

Knowing everyone’s name and who they are makes your team feel seen. Writing a thank you note for a job well done, or putting it out on your employee newsletters are other simple ways to recognize employees in front of their peers. Of course, compensation and benefits never hurt, and even in the benefits world, there are creative HR solutions such as Oyster Sunday, Vitable Health, and other cafeteria plan products outside the norm that are considerably less expensive.

Lead by example.

When I first opened Fork, that meant rolling up my sleeves every day to help the team—and proving that I was part of the team. Of course, I still LOVE that, but a lot has changed, and it is no longer possible for me to be part of service every day (nor is it healthy for my management to have me hovering over every detail!). To be a leader, you need to be a rock for your team; it means building your executive presence so that people view you as being gracious to each person on the team.

Empower your team.

To empower your team means giving up control of certain decisions to your team members. Will Guidara gives the perfect example in his book Unreasonable Hospitality when he empowers his dream weavers to create the perfect over-the-top gestures for their guests. If we acknowledge our own mistakes, allow others to make mistakes in their management growth—we are creating a safe, trusted working environment.

Offer mentorship and tailored professional growth opportunities.

Not every person wants to become a chef or GM. If they want to be in social media marketing, perhaps involve them in that. Look for ways to open training opportunities—whether it’s internal or external, cross training, or through leadership development paths. These could be as simple as a farm visit or covering a portion of outside training.

Protect your team’s time and energy.

One of the main causes of burnout in our industry is the deluge of timely, important needs and communication that seems to occur 24/7. Everyone needs time off and space to decompress, though. To combat the issue, we’ve set boundaries and communication norms that we enforce:

• Email is for external constituents

• Microsoft Teams chat is for lower priority

• Text is something you should know about immediately

• A phone call means 911

Image credit: Ellen Yin

Final thought

These initiatives may sound simple, but they require dedication to execute—especially during stressful times. I am continually checking myself to ensure that the majority of what I say and do reinforces these ideas.

My advice: start small. A few simple-yet-intentional initiatives can go a long way toward building your reputation as a great employer, fueling internal referral hires, and creating operational consistency. But more than anything, they’ll help create a workforce that feels valued, supported, and ultimately rewarded.

As with most things in our world, all of this is easier said than done. What must not be lost with internal hospitality is extending that same care to yourself, too. Take care of your team—and take care of yourself.

The author serves on OpenTable’s advisory board and is compensated for this role.
Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

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Author Bio: Ellen Yin is known for acclaimed restaurants like Fork, High Street, a.kitchen+bar, and The Wonton Project. A James Beard “Outstanding Restaurateur” (2023), she’s a leader in Philadelphia’s culinary and civic scenes, serving on several local and national boards. She is also co-founder of Sisterly Love Collective, which supports women entrepreneurs in the restaurant and culinary space. Ellen holds both her undergraduate and MBA degrees from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

When we say “mise en place” in a kitchen, we’re not just talking about neatly chopped onions or stock simmering in the back. We’re talking about preparation—the kind that keeps the chaos from turning into a crisis. It’s the discipline behind the hustle. And if you’ve worked in this industry long enough, you know the real chaos doesn’t always come from a dinner rush. It comes from life.

A diagnosis. A hurricane. A kitchen fire. A closed restaurant. A mental health spiral that’s been bubbling under the surface for years.

We prep for dinner service like our jobs depend on it—because they do. But when it comes to preparing for the kind of life-altering crisis that hits with no warning, too many of us are caught off guard. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

That’s why I started Southern Smoke Foundation. After years working in kitchens and conversations with people across the industry, it was clear—we needed better support. Today, Southern Smoke shows up for food and beverage workers when the bottom drops out from under them, whether it’s with emergency relief funding or mental health counseling. And while we can’t stop every crisis, we can help you prepare for them—this guide gives you recommendations on how.

Most people don’t realize what it takes to ask for help

Another hard truth I’ve seen over and over again: most people don’t realize how much goes into applying for financial help—until it’s too late. Now’s the time to get ahead of it. Think about:

• How to talk to your landlord and get something—anything—in writing

• What to ask your employer for

• How to follow up on your application

• Even a reminder to check your spam folder

“We’ve got to stop acting like it’s normal to suffer in silence.”

Mental health matters. Period.

Here’s something I say often: if you’re struggling, you are not alone. This industry is hard. It wears on your body, your relationships, and your mind.

We’ve got to stop acting like it’s normal to suffer in silence.

There are confidential, no-cost mental health counseling programs, like Southern Smoke’s Behind You program, available to food and beverage workers. Our organization offers up to 20 no-cost sessions. Telehealth is available, too, because we’re committed to removing obstacles to care. And if you’re not in a covered state, we’ve got financial assistance available to help pay for care through our Emergency Relief Fund.

If you’re in immediate crisis, don’t wait. Call 988 or use the national mental health hotline. Text AYUDA for Spanish-speaking counselors. These resources are there for a reason, and no one should have to navigate this stuff alone.

Your team takes cues from you

Running a restaurant is already a balancing act, and then a crisis hits and it’s a Category 5 storm. But as an owner or operator, you need to be the calm in the storm for your team.

Have a plan for communicating with your staff. Know where your insurance policies are. Back up your payroll and vendor data to the cloud. Create a checklist of who is on payroll and who needs help in case of furloughs. Take photos of your equipment for potential insurance claims. Know your reopening protocol before you ever have to use it.

And above all: be honest with your team. Tell them what you know and what you don’t. Be human about it. That’s leadership.

A toolkit you hope you never need—but will be glad you have

Yeah, it’s grim to talk about natural disasters and mental health emergencies and eviction notices. But it’s real—and Southern Smoke exists for these exact moments. Since we started, we’ve distributed over $15.1 million to food and beverage workers nationwide and provided access to more than 9,100 mental health counseling sessions. We do this because the people behind the bar, at the host stand, on the line, and in the dish pit matter.

And after years of witnessing crises, Southern Smoke has put together something simple to help you navigate these moments: a Crisis Toolkit.

It’s a living, breathing document that Southern Smoke has created to help our community be ready—not just when disaster strikes, but before. Think of it as the binder you hope you’ll never have to open but will be damn glad you did. It’s a practical guide that includes:

• Step-by-step checklists for fires, floods, outages, and more

• Tips for crisis communications and organizational strategies

• Insurance and financial information to help speed up recovery

• Staff resources for mental health crises, legal aid, and more

Download the Toolkit

“We take care of others all the time. Now it’s time to take care of ourselves.”

Because this industry deserves better

If there’s one thing I know, it’s this: we are a family in this industry. Dysfunctional sometimes, but family. And when one of us goes down, we show up. Southern Smoke is just one piece of that support system—but it’s a piece built by people who’ve worked every job in this business and know the grind. It was specifically created for you, the people rushing to work to make sure the community is fed after a major crisis, because that’s what we do, no matter how personally affected we are. It’s hospitality, and it’s beautiful.

Print this toolkit. Share it. Use it in your staff meetings. Tape it to your walk-in. Because if you’re not in crisis now, someone on your team will be eventually. And you can be the person who makes that situation a little bit better.

We take care of others all the time. Now it’s time to take care of ourselves.

Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable. These insights reflect one restaurateur’s experience and are not legal or professional advice.

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Author Bio: James Beard Award-winning Chef Chris Shepherd has transformed Houston’s culinary scene through restaurants like Underbelly and his foundation, Southern Smoke, which has distributed over $15.1 million in relief and funded 9,100 counseling sessions. He also hosts the Emmy-winning TV show Eat Like a Local.

Will AI Kill Hospitality? by Dan Simons

Of course, hospitality is dead; slaughtered by the robots, the AI brains, the automated everything… or at least, that’s what I am hearing from some corners. From where I sit, which is often Table 121 at my restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue in our nation’s capital, I see it differently. Very differently.

AI will have a bigger impact than I, and most of us, can presume to fully comprehend—as did so many of the revolutionary inventions that have preceded it. Fire? Electricity? The Industrial Revolution? Internet?

There are three things I’m certain about, though:

1. AI is here to stay.

2. We get and stay fluent using AI… or we get left behind.

3. AI is, and will be, a hospitality multiplier.

5 MOTIVATIONS FOR LEARNING & DEVELOPING AN AI STRATEGY

I have immersed myself in AI strategy and tasked my team members to learn more about how AI can support their work across functions, from kitchen design to marketing to guest engagement.

Here are some of the reasons why I’m prioritizing a plan to engage and implement AI for my restaurants, catering company, distillery, bakery, and even my personal life:

Competitive Advantage:

My competitors using AI will generate more results than I will without it. That might mean they can keep their menu prices lower, pay their people more, or have a marketing strategy that crushes mine. If I don’t innovate, I will fall behind..

Employee Evolution:

My younger employees will likely eclipse my ability to understand what they are doing and how they are doing it. The clueless leader cannot actually lead.

Industry Transformation:

Restaurants have notoriously lagged in productivity compared to other industries. This is changing, and the old ways of doing things won’t cut it anymore. We adapt or die.

Strategy Over Tactics:

Tactics without strategy are like mise en place without a recipe. Sometimes I might get lucky, but over time, I end up somewhere undesired.

Lifelong Learning:

Great leaders—the ones who win—are lifelong learners, are continually curious, and are always looking for ways to be better, smarter, and kinder.

Image credit: Dan Simons

AI STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT

It’s OK to feel clueless about AI. It’s a common starting place, and it was certainly mine.

My process for developing an AI strategy was not linear. I could call it jumbled, but to fancy me up, I’ll call it circular and iterative. And ongoing. Let me walk you through it.

Envisioning the possibilities

As I looked across our 1,600 employees and our 70,000 weekly diners at Founding Farmers Restaurant Group, I envisioned all the ways things might be different—from recruiting and hiring to training, performance measurement, productivity, compensation, purchasing, food safety, menu analytics, accounts payable, and accounts receivable.

The list felt endless (because it is), and so I started to rank topics—by cost in annual dollars, by largest impact on morale and culture, and by remembering Stephen Covey’s “big rocks and little rocks” principle (prioritize the most important tasks—or the tiny, worthless stuff will fill your time). My ranking became groupings of big rocks, medium rocks, and small rocks, allowing me to focus on where big change could create the most value.

Strategy for the strategy

You read that right—I knew I needed a plan for how to make the plan. One key benefit of having a plan is that you avoid getting pulled down the many rabbit holes of AI software pitches and demos. Instead, you follow your plan and stay on course.

I even started our plan with the support of AI itself. After honing my “prompt engineering” skills, I asked Claude (if you don’t know Claude, he’s worth befriending at Claude.AI) to generate an executive-level plan for our AI strategy. By telling Claude about me, our company, goals, status quo, resources, and limitations, I got him to produce my “Company-Wide Exploration Strategy for AI.” With a little more prompting, Claude even created a slide deck with visuals. Pretty cool, right? Of course, it still required thoughtful human brain(s) to review and revise, but it took Claude three minutes to get to a workable draft.

Getting started

It’s fair to presume that everyone reading this is at their own unique place with their AI familiarity and journey. Feel good about that, especially if you’re a novice. Also know that anyone who thinks they know it all is simply wrong and should brake-check themselves.

I started with basic education, taking a course to learn the vocabulary, the basic structure of how AI can work, and current major players. I really liked the intro course from Coursiv. It was super easy, can be done via an app on a phone or via desktop, and it provides interactive learning to get up to speed on the basics. I’m also fortunate to have my brother, a brilliant (and lovely) computer scientist, willing to mentor me in terms I can understand.

“Working with AI means we gain more time and money to provide the love and care that only humans can provide”My recommendation is to simply dive in, learn the basics, and start to frame your plan. You’ll find an endless buffet of AI tools, bots, agentic workflows, plug-ins, and AI-enabled equipment, many of which can be bought off the shelf and implemented. I’ve already deployed two of them system-wide:

• Slang AI to provide remarkable voice AI answering my phones.

• Hermetic AI, which engages every inbound web inquiry about group dining and private events—within nine seconds.

I trust these tools just like I’d trust an employee. That trust starts with a transparent understanding about what we need and what the employee (or the AI) needs to be successful. From there, it takes onboarding, training, and perpetual feedback. AI is not just set it and forget it—when done right, wow, does it enhance and magnify what our humans are able to do for our guests. In our case, we’re talking about a 65% reduction in hours in human phone answering (allowing those humans to do more valuable work) and 70% increase (seriously!) in engagement with group dining inquiries.

Evaluating your options

As you develop your AI strategy, also plan how you will evaluate the tools. I started by ranking the areas where I saw the most value, then created a matrix to vet potential partners. I looked at things like how the company is funded, their path to profitability, and what platform their AI is on—since most are built on top of one of the big corporations like Microsoft, OpenAI, Google, Amazon, Adobe, etc.

Most people pitching you won’t have good answers—avoid those companies. If they clear this first hurdle, then ask what real restaurant problem they are solving and how easily their tool integrates into your tech stack.

If the tech lift is too high or they don’t have the integrations, move-on. This should at least get you to a place where you are only considering AI tools that have a reasonable chance of working for your business.

But, let me get back to where I started.

AI will not kill hospitality. It is just the opposite.

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Image credit: Dan Simons

AI IS, AND WILL BE, A HOSPITALITY MULTIPLIER

Here are some of the exciting ways AI has the potential to support hospitality; this is merely the beginning of my thoughts:

Dynamic Menu Pricing

There are a wide variety of approaches to try and recover the loss from third-party platform pricing and fees. Some restaurants use the same as their printed menu prices, others charge more either by a set amount (eg, 50 cents) or by a percentage. But how do you know if your strategy is working? What is your competition doing? What if you could adjust your online menu pricing automatically to compete more effectively based on time of day, day of week, and whatever your competition is doing?

We know many restaurants can’t do dynamic pricing if they have printed menus (clearly digital menu boards are easily able to do this), but since our full-service restaurants have digital-only menus for delivery/to-go orders placed through websites and apps, AI tools can help us manage our pricing. Think about how airlines do such amazingly profitable things with pricing.

Grill Analysis

This could eliminate over cooking or undercooking a steak. Sure, you might think, but I can’t delegate that. The grill cook or sous chef are the talent, and that’s their craft. Sure, that’s a good point. So, are you saying you currently cook steaks perfectly to temp, literally 100% of the time? If not, letting AI help you be perfect seems like a perfect dose of culinary hospitality.

Menu Engineering

AI menu analytics will leapfrog our menu development from the spreadsheet-based tool we have been using since the 1970s to a vastly superior analysis of product mix (PMIX) and station load, as well as the ability to predict our PMIX after changes are made, and more.

And that’s just the guest-facing aspect—menu engineering can also help restaurants maximize profitability by identifying and incorporating more high-margin items and reducing costs through smarter inventory management and ingredient choices.

AI-Driven Customer Relationship Management (CRM) or Loyalty Programs

These tools can provide deep insights into our servers, bartenders, and diners, so we’ll have more available time and intel to help our teams thrill our guests.

Social Media & Marketing

This represents one of the most obvious applications. AI can streamline content creation by generating engaging posts and targeted ad copy, automatically editing and captioning video reels for maximum impact. It can also develop sophisticated strategies by analyzing audience behavior patterns, engagement metrics, and competitive landscapes to optimize posting schedules and content themes.

AI can assist us in so many ways to make smarter decisions across the hospitality business, even optimizing floor plans and kitchen layouts for maximum throughput and analyzing food waste and improving energy efficiency. But it’s not just about margins.

Working with AI means we gain more time and money to provide the love and care that only humans can provide… for our people, our guests, and our communities.

And, even better, AI will give me more time to sit at Table 121 and daydream about a hospitality-filled future.

The author serves on OpenTable’s advisory board and is compensated for this role.
Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

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Author Bio: A lifelong restaurateur, Dan Simons is a leader in mission-driven business practices, known for championing people-centric culture and responsible industry standards while developing systems that deliver profitability. He is a Co-Founder of Founding Farmers Restaurant Group, in partnership with Michael Vucurevich and the North Dakota Farmers Union. Also a university teacher, podcaster, and speaker, look for Dan in one of his restaurants, visit his blog, or check out his podcast, Founding DC.

You sort of learn as you go in this world. I started cooking as a kid with my mother and grandmother, later my father, who was the best cook in the family by far. At age 14, I got my first job in a restaurant shucking oysters. I made what today would be called plateau de mer at a seafood restaurant in Long Island. Back then, when someone ordered a ‘home run’ at the raw bar, they got 6 clams, 6 oysters, a half-chilled lobster, about 20 mussels in a sturdy mustard vinaigrette, a few sauces, and a half-pound of shrimp in the shell. I tried to make it pretty since we charged about $9. That was in the summer of 1974. We didn’t sell crudo.

One way or another, with the exception of a year of homelessness that culminated in a failed suicide attempt that kick-started my sobriety in January of 1992, I have taken a restaurant paycheck of some kind for almost 50 years straight. I worked for Alain Senderens in the early 1980s at his 3 Michelin star L’Archestrate when it was the best restaurant in Paris, and I flipped burgers at Patty & Frank’s in Atlanta a few weeks ago. I have done every job in this industry except somm work—though I drank a lot of wine, which I think should count. Over all those years, I have had the privilege of serving our community in many ways, and along the way, I paid attention.

That’s why, even with all the current headwinds, I remain bullish on restaurants. Because our community is the most resilient, most creative, and most thoughtful business archetype that I know. We are eternal because our work is grounded in a commitment to serving others. I believe taking care of others is our highest calling—and that is what we do.

“Our community is the most resilient, most creative, and most thoughtful business archetype that I know.”

But make no mistake, the restaurant industry is facing some serious challenges as we swing into the rest of 2025. I see at least seven pressing ones, followed by one massive reason for hope:

1. Escalating operational costs are squeezing margins:

Independent restaurants are grappling with sizable increases in food prices, labor expenses, and overhead—tightening margins in an industry already operating on thin profits. Global economic uncertainty and climate events continue to disrupt supply chains, leading to shortages and even greater last-minute increased costs.

2. The labor pool is shrinking:

Hiring and keeping qualified staff continues to impact service quality, consistency, and operational efficiency. As reported by Eater, and many others, a huge swath of our people left the industry in 2020 and 2021—and we still haven’t replaced them.

3. Tech is evolving faster than budgets:

Rapid technological innovation—AI tools, contactless dining, automation—requires investment and training. Some independents can’t afford these expenditures. We risk falling behind, or wasting money, on tech we can’t fully implement.

4. Consumer preferences are changing:

Delivery preferences, ghost kitchens, shifts in consumer sentiment and behavior—these are all real national trends that require immediate adjustments to meet evolving consumer patterns. A recent Lending Tree survey found that more than three-quarters of Americans (78%) now consider fast food to be a luxury. Let that sink in.

5. The Green Machine isn’t optional:

According to a PWC study, consumers expect eco-friendly practices and more transparency than ever before. If you aren’t already prioritizing sustainability—reducing food waste, purchasing regenerative goods, and so on—you’re not meeting consumers where they are at. But making that shift costs money.

6. Profitability demands creativity:

Economic conditions aren’t rosy, which means your value propositions must rule your pricing strategy and menu planning. But how do you grow profitably and offer better wages and non-monetary compensation to the team? That’s the heart of today’s restaurant ops dilemma. My advice: meet with your staff every day. Ask for feedback. Be honest with them about daily realities. Creativity is a group sport, so co-create your solutions. Make sure you are all on the same page before implementing big changes.

7. It’s hard to stand out:

Large chains have economies of scale and advanced technologies. That puts pressure on independents to differentiate. The goal isn’t to be the best—it’s to be the only. That’s a winning strategy in this competitive landscape.

This picture sounds just awful, horrendous in fact. Why would anyone stay in this business, let alone have the faith to sustain our restaurants in these terrible times, and come out of it THRIVING? Well, I believe we can. I put my money where my mouth is with several of my own businesses. Why? Glad you asked.

Because here’s the good news: We’re already doing many of the things that make restaurants so special—like fully engaging with guests and taking responsibility for their happiness while they’re in our dining room, or asking every day how we can do more for our guests and staff.

A few weeks ago, I dined at a small but mighty restaurant in Austin called Birdie’s. They have world-class food and a superb beverage program, all done via counter service. You order at the cashier, food gets coursed out and brought to your table. The co-owner told me that the strategy has helped them cut their labor cost by a significant double-digit percentage, without sacrificing hospitality. When my bill came, a large piece of paper was tucked behind it…a menu from a restaurant I worked at 40 years ago in NYC. I cried. I was beyond impressed with every single moment of my time there—the care, the attention to detail.

Where do you think I’ll be eating every time I’m in Austin from now on?

“We’re already doing many of the things that make restaurants so special…”

Independent restaurants foster loyal followings by offering the kind of personalized experiences that chains can’t replicate. We can adapt menus quickly, adjust hours, shift staffing, rethink service styles, and more. That elasticity is a superpower. Diners increasingly crave unique, authentic dining experiences—and we can deliver that naturally. And I am guessing you can find ways to make those experiences even more memorable.

Your restaurants are run by people deeply invested in their craft and community. Talk about that more! Most restaurants don’t explain what makes them great, special, or different—and that stuns me. Because the ones that do earn real trust from their guests.

And no, that doesn’t mean your server needs to spend more time at the table jabbering while guests are trying to enjoy their meal. A hamburger stall in a food court can simply hang a sign that says, “We only use prime, fresh meats and all natural ingredients. All burgers are cooked to order—thanks in advance for your patience.” That’s communication. That’s setting expectations. I would wait in that line for sure.

When Husk first opened in Charleston, the food was superb. But what really blew my mind was the large chalkboard listing the name of every purveyor they used and what each one brought in that day. Updating that list was a part of daily side work. That’s great marketing and communication that spoke volumes about their commitment to a local/fresh ethos.

Creativity doesn’t stop there. From pop-ups to meal kits to fine dining delivery, independents proved in 2020-2022 that they can pivot fast and innovate under pressure. Well, guess what? It’s time to dig in again and be the most creative operator you can be. These times require it. They require more service in every sense of the word. I insist that it’s the rewards of service to our fellows that fulfills us. You wouldn’t be reading this far if you weren’t like me, someone whose cup is filled every time we do something for another human being. It is the historical foundation of our profession, dating back thousands of years, and it is just as important today as it was back then. Our transactions aren’t just financial when the check gets paid. They are emotional and charitable, and occur over and over throughout the guest experience.

Here’s what I know for sure:
Restaurateurs and food people have more heart, more hustle, more grit than any other business group I’ve ever encountered. That’s our edge. That’s our legacy. So go be the “only.” Not because you have to—but because that’s who we are. And as long as you honor the eternal-ism of a service mindset, you’ll always find your way forward.

Do that. Be the ‘only,’ and I can’t wait to hear your next success story.

Best,

AZ

Author Bio: An Emmy-winning and four-time James Beard Award-winning TV personality, chef, writer, and teacher, Andrew Zimmern is regarded as one of the most versatile and knowledgeable personalities in the food world. For more, visit his website or Substack.

Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable

Restaurants being fraught with peril is an old story, but there’s a survival map—and the X sits at the intersection of art and commerce. It’s not easy to find, but if you create art, defend it with financial responsibility, plug the leaks, treat your teams well, and stay the course, it’s achievable.

I learned that lesson the hard way, long before I knew what a pro forma was—or that a “financial model” could carry real stakes.

When Hurricane Opal hit the Florida Panhandle in 1995, its storm surge couldn’t quite reach my little wine bar perched on a hill in Blue Mountain Beach, but it managed to knock out the two bridges on either side, turning my business into a beautiful, unreachable island.

By January, three months later, I sat down to balance my checkbook and discovered a number that was both exact and existential: $1.

Up until that moment, there was very little science to what I did. We were a crew of four, guessing our way through economics—triple the raw food cost, double the bottle price, pour 6.25 ounces per glass, and pray the math worked out. It didn’t, but the customers were happy. I was 99% artist and 1% businessman, and the artist was running the asylum.

Then, on January 15, 1996, I cracked open Restaurants That Work by Martin E. Dorf and met the wild notion that restaurants could be both artistically profound and profitable. The case studies in this 33-year-old manual were shocking in their simplicity: for every dollar earned, 30 cents went to food, 30 to labor, 4 to rent, 20 to everything else, and 20 to profit.

“Fuck,” I thought. “I’m doing this wrong.”

I was 99% artist and 1% businessman, and the artist was running the asylum

So I poured myself what can only be described as a generous glass of wine, grabbed my oversized Texas Instruments calculator, and did the math: 47% cost of goods, 6% rent, 30% labor, and 16% everything else. What was left? One lonely percent.

We were living on tips, fumes, and shift drinks—but at least now, I knew why.

To a certain extent, restaurant financial models are a choose-your-own-adventure story.

I know operators who pour oceans of capital into kitchens, infrastructure, furniture, and design. The rent alone could fund a small nation, but the places stay packed, which drives down labor and rent percentages, and they manage cost of goods sold (COGS) like sorcerers. It’s a Hollywood production: blockbuster energy, box-office hit, and art designed to play anywhere in the world.

Then there’s the indie darling: modest design, high COGS, high pay for a fiercely loyal staff, and a location that’s one wrong turn off the grid. It’s Bottle Rocket, shot on a handheld, fueled by heart, and destined to earn its cult following.

Some groups find a hit and just keep cloning it. That’s The Fast and the Furious model. If the car still runs and the crowd’s still cheering, why not keep driving it off new cliffs?

Then there’s the Daniel Day-Lewis approach: a finite number of carefully chosen projects, slow and steady, each one a brick in a legacy wall.

And finally, there’s the wild-card career, the one that reads like a chaotic IMDb page—different genres, different risks, sometimes brilliance, sometimes box-office poison. You’d like to think the only real dealbreaker in that model is a bad script.

Pro formas, meanwhile, are their own mysterious genre. If you don’t want your rent to exceed 6%, you’d better have a sharp sense of your top line before you sign the lease. My partner and I have been fairly lucky guessing what that number should be, or at least lucky enough that the opening-night reviews kept us funded for the sequel.

By the way, Martin Dorf’s model has slowly eroded over time. The national average in 2025 was 2.8%, while our internal aspirational goal at Boka is 22% blended cost of goods sold, 6% occupancy, 38% labor, and 22% everything else, which leaves 12% profit.

Film analogies only go so far. When a movie hits theaters, opening night is as good as it’s ever going to get. Restaurants are different. That beautiful blueprint you inked and obsessively budgeted can unravel for a hundred reasons: a sous-chef quits mid-service, the weather tanks patio season, a government regulation changes, a critic has indigestion, or a rogue purchaser starts ordering truffles by the kilo.

It’s less like a film and more like a play. During previews, you tweak lines, change blocking, and swap the lighting gels until the story lands. The restaurant equivalent is those first six weeks after opening—part terror, part improvisation, all high stakes.

When theory and reality part ways, and they will, we go hunting for the leak. Here’s the grid we use to find where the numbers start to drift:

The Leak Finder’s Guide

1. Cost out every menu item using current invoices, not wishful thinking.

2. Match your menu prices to your POS—you’d be shocked how often they drift apart.

3. Audit your recipes—make sure measurements aren’t being freelanced by “feel.”

4. Standardize BTG wine pours (for us 5 ounces, carafe or marked glass, no freelancing).

5. Track waste religiously—spill sheets count.

6. Verify every ring-in—if it pours, it better score.

7. Lock your storage—liquor, beer, and wine; temptation is not a management strategy.

8. Check invoices line by line when product comes in; don’t trust labels or smiles.

9. Reconcile monthly—make sure statements match what you actually received.

10. Ask vendors to flag price changes before they land on your invoice.

11. Be ruthless about comps—log them, categorize them, own them.

12. Set party budgets early and confirm headcounts; BEOs are aspirational, not gospel.

13. Use value wines for events and always ring in event consumption separately.

14. Code invoices correctly—accounting clarity saves arguments later.

16. Allocate event revenue fairly between food and beverage; truth lives in the splits.

17. Adjust prices strategically—nudge, don’t shock, in sync with product mix.

18. Collect credits promptly—money forgotten is money lost.

19. Keep cocktail costs in the 10-15% pocket—beyond that, you’re buying art with no resale value.

20. Hold BTG costs near 15-20%—otherwise you’re serving ego by the glass.

21. Use dynamic markups on wine—cheap wines carry higher margins; expensive bottles sell bragging rights.

22. Monitor cameras at exits—theft is real.

23. Investigate transfer SOPs within Hotels or Chef-grouped restaurants that share products

24. Use “boomers,” so prep teams don’t just get into a rhythm of prepping the same amounts. Boomers are simply writing prep sheets daily (analog) based on prior days’ product mix.

25. If you are utilizing line check, make sure you are comping and accounting for.

26. Make sure family meal is accounted for (and costed).

27. Account for delivery fees or surcharges on food costs.

28. Make sure you are winning on event menus more than regular menus.

Numbers are emotional creatures, they respond to attention. Ignore them, and they quietly plot your demise. But stare too long at the numbers, and the story begins to fade. No one ever came to dinner for the math.

Boka has been open for 23 years—it survived the economic crash of 2008, street closures, mechanical failures, chef changes, snowmageddon and the pandemic.

Art and commerce will always wrestle for control, but somewhere in the middle is where restaurants truly live. Respect the art, honor the numbers, and you might just make it to your next act.

The author serves on OpenTable’s advisory board and is compensated for this role. Any views, thoughts, and opinions expressed by the Author are solely that of the Author and do not reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of OpenTable.

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Author Bio: James Beard Award–winning restaurateur Kevin Boehm has opened more than 50 restaurants over the past 30 years, building Boka Restaurant Group into one of the most celebrated hospitality companies in the world. With partner Rob Katz, he has launched over 40 acclaimed concepts, earning Michelin stars and national awards. In 2019, the duo won the James Beard Award for Outstanding Restaurateur. His debut memoir, The Bottomless Cup (Abrams Press), publishes in fall 2025.