It’s been a stormy sea of late for anyone involved with bars and restaurants for reasons too numerous to mention here, but paramount has been the need to attract and retain staff. A business is only as good as the people who are in it and nowhere else is this more evident than in the hospitality biz.

So when we were tasked by the original bossman Tom Kerridge, to create a recruitment video campaign to span across all his businesses, first of all you say YES and then you think…but how are we going to make this stand out?

Tom has a number of enterprises all of which celebrate the very best in food, drinks and service. We had worked with Chef earlier in the year when he asked us to produce a mini documentary together all about how he sources his beef. (If you want to see the mini doc ‘Pasture to Plate’ then you’ll need to book yourself a table at The Hand & Flowers in Marlow…) During the filming, Tom listed every single movement and process needed to get a simple steak and chips to your table but more importantly, how many people it takes to do those processes.

The point he was making was that every member of his team are all cogs in a very well oiled machine. And sure, some cogs are bigger than others but it all works because all the cogs no matter their size, all turn in the same direction and for the same purpose.

Restaurants and bars are full of the most dynamic, passionate, creative, hard working and dedicated people who are truly skilled at what they do. Our idea was to demonstrate and champion all these personalities, highlight the variety of roles available within the businesses, whilst also making the content appealing to catch the eye of those who want to jump on board.

We visited all of the Kerridge group establishments, The Hand & Flowers, Butcher’s Tap, The Coach and Kerridge’s Bar & Grill at the Corinthia, London, to interview all the teams. A script was written which each of the team read out and we edited all of the cuts together to create a montage where it felt like everyone was finishing each other’s sentences.