What kick started the entrepreneurial spirit?
get to the restaurant if I’m working. If not, stay at home and work on some external stuff like marketing or partnerships. D: They have it so easy! We all have permission to get up quite late because usually we finish late. I spend most of my day in the kitchen, making pizzas, dealing with suppliers, ordering stock but also managing the place from a distance. When all three of us are in the restaurant and we have a chance to talk, ideas are flowing most of the time!
What role do you each play in the business? R. I’m the
Were there any particular bumps in the road that you had to get over? R. Learning Italian! But more seriously, every day there were at least two or three major issues like the ceiling falling in or damp in the walls or the pizza oven not working. Every problem has a solution though. D: With every business you get setbacks and at the beginning we were quite ambitious about our opening date. But you learn to account for unexpected stuff happening, which it always does. G: The original plan was to start an Italian street food business, back when Dan and I started thinking about it in year 12. D: Then, pretty much out of the blue, we were offered the chance to take over this space in Wandsworth, as the previous owners had just shut up shop. We went to have a look, and then it really just went from there! R: Mine began when they told me I’d get paid! I’m still waiting… What was the journey fromDulwich Leaver in the Summer to opening your own restaurant in December? R: Late nights, setbacks and a lot of thinking outside the box! It took us just over two months to set this place up and get it ready for customers, but it felt like a lot longer to be honest! G: It was relatively fast considering what we’ve actually done, but yes it was basically a lot of late nights, doing stuff which none of us really had any experience of before.
guy kicking everyone’s backside to get stuff done and to make
sure schedules at least try and get adhered to. I run the bar area and most of the floor, as well as making sure everything is up to scratch and working in the restaurant. G. I’m the ideas man, the blue sky thinker
if you like. As well as working on
the floor with Rob a lot of the time, I’m accountable for marketing and the finances. D. I’m the
Medium term (next year) Long term (next five years)? R: Short term we’re looking at paying ourselves a decent wage, as well as trying to make an impact on the local food scene as much as we can, building a nice relationship with the local community. D: Next year we’ll all be going to University, at least that is the plan at the moment, so the challenge will be managing it from afar, hiring and expanding into street food, which as we may remember was actually the original business. G: Long term it gets a bit trickier to answer, but there is no point in going into anything without ambition, which is what we all have fundamentally. If all goes well at this site, and the street food side is netting us enough, we’d like to expand to another location. That would be phenomenal, but at the moment we’re taking it a day at a time.
guy who actually knows what he’s doing when it comes
to restaurants! No, joking aside, I run the kitchen and deal with the suppliers, stock, etc. More importantly I also make sure Rob and Giacomo approach the floor and the customers in the right way. What does an average day look like? R. Wake up tired, at noon, check my phone to see the myriad of problems which have occurred. Find solutions to the problems, head to work and set up…. Have a brilliant night on the floor with Giacomo then finish up around 2am. G: I try to exercise before I come in. Check emails, social media, then
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