Business
ensuring its preservation. “We’ve done lots of individual restaurants before, but creating eight on one floor is another matter altogether,” explains Jones. “Until it is fully operational, I’m not sure if we’ve pulled it off.”
As well as making it look stunning, the biggest challenge has been ensuring that it works practically. To ensure it does, much role-play was undertaken to ensure how, for instance, a glass was going to get to a table, be removed after use, washed and returned. Gareth Banner, the managing director of
the Ned, who was appointed from his former general manager role at the Renaissance St Pancras hotel, London, and is the person ultimately responsible for the hotel on a day- to-day basis, explains the logistics. “We have a central production kitchen, which feeds into all the restaurants, as well as a specific kitchen for each restaurant,” he says.
“The restaurants will all be run indepen- dently with their own head chef, restaurant manager and team, while behind the scenes there will be a lot of shared services – such as purchasing – for synergy and efficiencies.” A key departure for a UK hotel will be
the extent that entertainment plays within the restaurant space, creating a real sense of occa- sion. “It’s not uncommon to go to a hotel and find a piano being played from 7pm onwards,” says Banner. “Here we have an entire enter- tainment and production team, headed by Dom Chung, who has put together a programme of performances that will kick off from mid-afternoon, Monday to Friday, or during brunch at the weekends.
“There will be a mix of burlesque, choirs, orchestras – we’ve even created our own Ned band – which will all perform on a stage at the heart of the banking hall. The acts will be predominately music-led, but not exclusively. There will also be some performing arts and variety. It is not often that a hotelier has a
Cecconi’s
“We’ve done lots of individual restaurants before, but creating eight on one floor is another matter” Nick Jones
seven-figure budget for entertainment.” Banner says the experience will take dining room entertainment to “a whole new level”, but ensures that the performances will not compete with the attention of guests who want a quieter evening. “There will be some tables which will be hidden and will only hear the music in the background,” he says.
EU staff
Staffing the Ned with a team of 800 is what has kept Banner awake at night more than anything else since his appointment. The process, however, has been on track, with many individuals being recruited directly from Europe, despite the uncertainty of what Brexit will mean in the long-term with regard to employing staff from within the EU. Teams of recruiters have appointed locally in Rome and Barcelona through the offer of attractive packages, rather than wait for indi- viduals to come to the UK and for the Ned to then compete with another 10 or so businesses for their services.
Cosy bedroom 22 | The Caterer | 28 April 2017
“It is a worry and a concern for everyone in our industry how the government is going to deal with the immigration situation,” says Jones. “Over 75% of the people who work for Soho House in the UK weren’t born in this country. I’m sure the government will consider a way around it – they are going to have to.” Banner explains that finding people has not been the difficulty, but seeking out recruits who are going to be successful has been more
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