IN SERVICE 02 – Common Appetite
The latest issue of our trend report, for your reading pleasure
We’ve just launched the digital edition of our second issue of IN SERVICE on socials, and we have a very limited run of printed copies available to friends in the industry.
For this issue, which looks towards the rest of 2025, we’ve chosen the theme of Common Appetite to interrogate the ever-expanding and blurring lines of the food world, honing in on how our tastes and habits of consumption are impacted by our choices of where and what to eat.
We hope you give it a read!
We share an essay that reflects on certain cultural moments from 2024 and the place of food and drink within them, penned by our friend Cat Sarsfield. We present intimate insights from dialogues between trailblazers – Slutty Cheff and Marina O’Loughlin compare notes on navigating anonymity and criticism, while Ed McIlroy and Trevor Gulliver discuss the joy and rigour of running restaurants.
We also speak with colleagues, clients and collaborators across the cultural industries to give their Hot Takes for 2025, and we offer our own forecasts too, with People to Pay Attention to and What’s In.
As we reflected on 2024, one thread remained clear: we’re longing for the familiar comforts of the past while also holding an eager anticipation for better things to come. We wish to see diversity of thought prioritised across the hospitality industry and more attention given to varied voices. To do that, we have a collective responsibility to ensure we never stop making room for new ideas, embracing other ways of doing things and pushing for better, every step of the way. This has to come from the top just as much as it comes from our individual behaviours and everyday choices. At the end of the day, hospitality is all about making everyone feel welcome, so gatekeeping and elitism are out, embracing new audiences and celebrating an open food culture are in.
We cherish the simple yet profound act of sharing a table, both physically and virtually, and in everything we do, our intention is for more people to join us.
IN SERVICE (both the annual publication, and our more regular Substack) is a love letter to hospitality and the people working within and around it – for those who seek pleasure, find peace and provide solace through eating and drinking in good company.
Happy reading,
GB&C