Volatile chef Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant business is facing a $10.75 million loss attributed to its York & Albany pub and hotel in London and a one-off cost due to a lease issue.
The restaurant’s holding company, the Kavalake group, made $3.4 million last year, the UK's
Sunday Times said. The lease, which Ramsay is disputing in court, cost the company about $11.3 million, all as sales rose just 4 percent last year.
Urgent: Do You Approve Or Disapprove of President Obama's Job Performance? Vote Now in Urgent Poll
Even with the loss, Ramsay is continuing with expansion plans that will take his restaurant business into Asia.
Ramsay’s Bread Street Kitchen will open in Hong Kong in September, and additional restaurants are planned in the region throughout 2014 and into 2015. The company is partnering with Dining Concepts of Hong Kong for the expansion.
Ramsay’s company owns 12 restaurants in London. In addition to expanding into Hong Kong, the company is in discussion with Las Vegas Sands about expanding into Singapore and Macau,
a news release said. The company also plans more restaurants in London.
"This is an exciting step for the Group, not only to be entering Asia, which has such an amazing food culture, but also to bringing our London concepts, which have been such a success, to new markets," Ramsay said in the release.
Eater reported that the plans the "shouty chef" had to expand in the United States, though, are on hold as Ramsay battles it out in court with his former partner Rowen Seibel over their Fat Cow franchise.
Seibel filed a $10 million lawsuit accusing Ramsay of “deliberately” mishandling a trademark issue, whereas Ramsay says his ex-partner was “egregiously inept in management” and got the restaurant companies fined for paying employees incorrectly, Eater said.
Urgent: Assess Your Heart Attack Risk in Minutes. Click Here.