Earnings outside the kitchen put celebrity chefs on the Rich List
Delia, Jamie and Gordon have proved that brand power is the key to success, following their inclusion in a list of the UK's richest chefs in the Mail on Sunday's annual Rich Report, published this Sunday (7 March).
Books, television shows, newspaper serialisations and endorsements mean that, for these three, the serious money is made out of the kitchen. Delia Smith is valued at £22m, Jamie Oliver at £17m and Gordon Ramsay at £15m.
No chef makes the report's main list of the country's 300 richest people, for which the cut-off is £125m.
"We expected Gordon Ramsay to be a lot higher," said report editor Rachel Oldroyd. "But like a lot of people in the restaurant business he has been struggling." Marco Pierre White is another absentee with the report claiming his accumulated businesses had lost nearly £8m in the last financial year.
Number two on the chef list is Michel Roux Snr, but his estimated value of £20m mistakenly takes into account the London restaurant Le Gavroche, in which he no longer has a stake.
Hotel owners fare much better on the list. Terry Matthews, owner of the Celtic Manor resort and a hotel in Canada is worth £1.01 billion (27th on the list); the owners of the Ritz, the Barclay Brothers, are worth £575m (59th); and Mohammed Al-Fayed, who owns the Paris Ritz, is said to be worth £560m (62nd). The report values Sir Rocco Forte at £400m (96th).
| The UK's 10 richest chefs 1 Delia Smith £22m 2 Michel Roux £20m 3 Jamie Oliver £17m 4 Gordon Ramsay £15m 5 Richard Shepherd £12.5m 6 Anton Mosimann £11m 7 Rick Stein £10.4m 8 Raymond Blanc £8m 9 Roy Ackerman £7.5m 10 Antonio Carluccio £7m |
Source: Caterer & Hotelkeeper magazine, 4 - 10 March 2004
