The Karlsson Catering Challenge

From our initial meeting Mattais’ passion for what he did and his wealth of experience as a chef was evident.  He clearly new about food and on seeing and tasting it I was blown away.  Even though he was only 32 at the time he already had a wealth of experience.  From winning young chef of the year 1995 in his homeland of Sweden and then working as Chef de Partie in Casino Operakallaren, a Michelin Starred restaurant, he travelled to Ireland at 21 to work as a head chef.  After a year he relocated to London to work as Commis Chef in one of London’s best restaurants, the 2 Michelin Starred, La Gavroche and then to Bristol as second chef in the Michelin starred Harvey’s.

By the age of 24 his passion and drive led him and a partner to opening their own fine dining restaurant, La Toque, in Beeston, Nottingham.  The restaurant won rave reviews but after time the fine dining model was hard to sustain and after 5 years a new investor came in and the restaurant changed to offer a less exclusive affair.

Always looking for a new challenge Mattias’ vision was to bring his years of experience in the restaurant industry and vast knowledge and experience of world cuisine to develop a catering company that delivered top restaurant quality food and service at an affordable price. It would also give him more flexibility in the kitchen to do what he does best.  He had the cooking skills but wasn't sure where to start to make it happen as a business.

Mattias’ food was of a quality to rival anything out there and the infrastructure he already had in place through his restaurant worked in his favour.  On the other hand this was to be a completely self-financed lone-venture for Mattias, which posed him some problems. Not only was his budget fairly limited for what he wanted to achieve, so was his time.  He was still working full time as head chef in his now part-owned restaurant while trying to set up his personal venture.

It was clear Mattias and I were very similar in our approach and shared a passion for our work. I could see the potential for his business if handled correctly and was excited about working with him and therefore put all my efforts into the project.  His initial thoughts were that he needed a website.  I agreed that a website should be part of the process but more importantly the creation of the Karlsson Catering brand should be the primary and main focus. The website should be a product of the brand and not vice-versa.

So we began work crafting the Karlsson brand that encapsulated Mattias’s values, work ethic and of course fabulous food.  In the process I also helped focus his ideas into a business model to not only launch his great brand but also see his business grow in the future.