Romanticise the Brand, Not the Burnout: What Founders Get Wrong About Starting a Restaurant

There’s a reason hospitality looks so dreamy online:

The lighting is great.

The plates are pretty.

The brand shots are polished.

  
What you don’t see is the founder trying to fix a broken oven at 6am.

Or the payroll needs

Or the bank balance that drops faster than the footfall.

Or the investor asking for numbers you haven’t started yet.

When people say they want to start a restaurant, they’re often picturing the fun part  the menu, the fit-out, the influencer launch night.

Then reality hits.

• Margins that feel tight from day one.

• Staff churn that knocks your confidence.

• Systems you didn’t know you needed until they break.

• Suppliers that send late orders.

None of this makes you a bad founder. It just means you’re seeing the truth behind the curtain. 

The strongest founders I’ve met don’t fall in love with the perfect version of the brand.

• They fall in love with daily problem-solving.

• They fall in love with making things better.

• They fall in love with the routine.

Build the brand you dream about  yes.

But don’t mistake passion for a plan.

The brands that scale are the ones that get the boring parts right too.

Romanticise the vision.

Not the burnout.