When I opened the Hand and Flowers, the first pub in Britain to receive two Michelin stars, we scrimped, saved, maxed out our credit cards and held our breath. It was 2005, and the economic climate was very different back then. People had more money in their pockets, Britain was still a member of the EU, and a global pandemic would have seemed like a far-fetched nightmare.
Today, I still firmly believe that if you have guts and determination, Britain can be a good place to open a restaurant or start a food business. But starting something is the easy part. Trying to keep that business open is now a different story altogether.
