Setting the Table Author: Danny Meyer | Language: English | ISBN:
B000OI0FCQ | Format: EPUB
Setting the Table Description
In October 1985, at age twenty-seven, Danny Meyer, with a good idea and scant experience, opened what would become one of New York City's most revered restaurants—Union Square Cafe. Little more than twenty years later, Danny is the CEO of one of the world's most dynamic restaurant organizations, which includes eleven unique dining establishments, each at the top of its game. How has he done it? How has he consistently beaten the odds and set the competitive bar in one of the toughest trades around?
In this landmark book, Danny shares the lessons he's learned while developing the winning recipe for doing the business he calls "enlightened hospitality." This innovative philosophy emphasizes putting the power of hospitality to work in a new and counterintuitive way: The first and most important application of hospitality is to the people who work for you, and then, in descending order of priority, to the guests, the community, the suppliers, and the investors. This way of prioritizing stands the more traditional business models on their heads, but Danny considers it the foundation of every success that he and his restaurants have achieved.
Some of Danny's other insights:
Hospitality is present when something happens for you. It is absent when something happens to you. These two simple concepts—for and to—express it all.
Context, context, context, trumps the outdated location, location, location.
Shared ownership develops when guests talk about a restaurant as if it's theirs. That sense of affiliation builds trust and invariably leads to repeat business.
Err on the side of generosity: You get more by first giving more.
Wherever your center lies, know it, name it, believe in it. When you cede your core values to someone else, it's time to quit.
Full of behind-the-scenes history on the creation of Danny's most famous restaurants and the anecdotes, advice, and lessons he has accumulated on his long and ecstatic journey to the top of the American restaurant scene, Setting the Table is a treasure trove of innovative insights that are applicable to any business or organization.
- File Size: 305 KB
- Print Length: 338 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0060742763
- Publisher: HarperCollins e-books; Reprint edition (October 13, 2009)
- Sold by: HarperCollins Publishers
- Language: English
- ASIN: B000OI0FCQ
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #18,198 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Business & Money > Industries > Hospitality, Travel & Tourism - #15
in Books > Business & Money > Industries & Professions > Hospitality, Travel & Tourism
- #2
in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Business & Money > Industries > Hospitality, Travel & Tourism - #15
in Books > Business & Money > Industries & Professions > Hospitality, Travel & Tourism
The 2006 Zagat Survey lists Gramercy Tavern as New York's most popular restaurant. (It was also #1 last year.)
Union Square Café came in second. (As it did last year.)
Eleven Madison Park ranked fourteen. (Down one from 2005.)
Tabla was eighteen. (Up one from 2005.)
Blue Smoke --- unranked in 2005 --- was the 36th most popular restaurant.
These Manhattan restaurants were all conceived by one man: Danny Meyer, who has also created the restaurants at The Museum of Modern Art and an outdoor joint called Shake Shack. Most restaurants fail, and quickly; these restaurants have, most of them, been around long enough to qualify as "institutions." If you have ever had the good fortune to sample Danny Meyer's food, you know they are likely to remain so deep into the future.
Now Danny Meyer has written a book. It is nominally a memoir about his life in restaurants. But although there are mouth-watering descriptions of great meals, it will be a great tragedy if this book becomes "food porn," devoured by foodies and unknown to the general public. This is a bigger book, and a better book, than that. (Not that there's anything wrong with food porn.) For one thing, it is a business book that should be read --- like: today! --- by anyone whose livelihood involves face-to-face encounters with customers. For another, it is a hands-on, real-world book of practical philosophy that could knock a great deal of sense into those who believe that nice guys finish last and the only way to get to the top is to kick others off the ladder as you claw your way up.
This book obeys the form of memoir, especially in the young Meyer's culinary education --- his writing will remind some readers of A.J.
This book will be of great interest and even greater value if one or more of the following is relevant to you:
1. You have direct and frequent contact with customers.
2. You train and/or supervise those who do.
3. You need to improve your "people skills" in your business and personal relationships.
4. Your organization has problems attracting, hiring, and then keeping the people it needs to prosper.
5. Your organization has problems with others who, for whatever reasons, consistently under-perform.
It is no coincidence that many of those on Fortune magazine's annual list of most admired companies reappear on its annual list of most profitable companies. Moreover, both customers and employees rank "feeling appreciated" among the three most important attributes of satisfaction. Now consider the total cost of a mis-hire or the departure of a peak performer: Estimates vary from six to 18 times the annual salary, including hours and dollars required by the replacement process.
Until now, I have said nothing about Danny Meyer nor about the restaurant industry so as to reassure those who read this brief commentary that, although Setting the Table does indeed provide interesting information about him and his background, the book's greater value derives (in my opinion) from the lessons he has learned from his successes and failures thus far, both within and beyond the kitchen.
One of the most important concepts in this book is hospitality. Here's what Meyer has to say about it: "hospitality is the foundation of my business philosophy. Virtually nothing else is as important as how one is made to feel in any business transaction. Hospitality exists when you believe the other person is on your side.
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