Interview with Guy Wachs, Co-Founder of Wild Honey

Learn about Wild Honey's success and hear tips for other restauranteurs

We interviewed Guy Wachs, co-founder of Wild Honey, the award-winning restaurant group celebrated for its imaginative and delectable all-day breakfast dishes. 

In addition to his success as a restaurateur, Guy is the author of the book Eggs For Dinner, which charts Guy’s journey and approach to business. He brings a unique perspective to the restaurant industry, continually pushing boundaries and setting new standards.

Let's dig in:

For anyone who hasn’t had the pleasure of dining at Wild Honey, please tell us about your restaurants. What can guests expect?

Guy: At Wild Honey, we strive to create a dining experience that is both unique and memorable. Our philosophy centers around the idea of all-day breakfast, where we offer an extensive menu inspired by traditional breakfast dishes from around the world.  Guests can expect a diverse menu that features a blend of traditional and contemporary flavors, with options to suit a variety of dietary preferences and needs. Our commitment to outstanding service ensures that every visit to Wild Honey is a delightful experience, leaving our guests satisfied and eager to return.

Inside Wild Honey Bugis

What are some of the biggest challenges you have faced in the restaurant industry and how have you managed to overcome them?

Guy: The shortage of hospitality professionals is our biggest challenge. Our strategy is a combination of creative hiring, strong leadership, cross training, constant innovation, technology and centralizing certain productions while tightly controlling the quality. 

How has your business grown or changed before, during, and after the pandemic? What strategies did you implement to adapt to the changing circumstances?

Guy: For us 2019 was the best year ever financially. After that we opened our third outlet in South Beach. This was hit badly by COVID-19. Our fast response early on, included frozen meals and island wide deliveries (delivery platforms were not ready for this)  We became a 24-hour open business. We partnered with NIO cocktails to deliver ready made drinks to hotels. We created new Job Descriptions for our staff (delivery on bicycles) to keep them busy. After the pandemic we decided to expand with a hotel partner (Ascott) and recently opened Wild Honey Bugis.

How has Waitrr benefitted your business?

Guy: It was a master stroke during the pandemic as people did not want to touch menus. It created new possibilities to preorder before arriving at Wild Honey. During the disruption of our banking merchant DBS last year our Waitrr transactions were not affected because they run separately. We view Waitrr as our security blanket so we sleep better at night.

What is something that everyone in the F&B industry should start (or stop) doing? 

Guy: We would love to see the industry start working together more robustly to solve some of the major issues the industry is facing. The industry is not well represented by a strong united body able to effectively represent our best interests to the government to try and tackle the fundamental challenges that affect everyone in the battle to hire for excellence

How do you handle customer feedback, both positive and negative? Can you share an example of how feedback has led to a significant change in your restaurant?

Guy: We reply to all customer feedback. Online reviews. Emails. And we do our level best to get in front of any issues in real-time if they are highlighted by the guest at the time of dining. We greatly value the feedback we receive especially when it is constructive and not destructive. We have often made changes to elements on our menu or service if we see similar comments being made. For example: we have reintroduced menu items that people really missed when we changed them out for new items, we changed our sausages back to the previous supplier even though we felt the new supplier provided a superior product, we re-engineered our brioche recipe based on feedback when we changed suppliers.

How often do you update your menu, and what inspires these changes?

Guy: We change menus every six months or so. We are inspired to keep innovating with ingredients, methods, tastes, and flavors although people love all our old dishes so this is such a challenge for us - balancing creating new exciting dishes against the well-loved favorites.

What trends do you see emerging in the restaurant industry, and how are you preparing for them?

Guy: We believe that technology will be encouraged to seek more efficiencies in an industry that struggles attaining an adequately skilled, motivated, and reliable work force. While some of these are amazing innovations, we believe that the hospitality and service quotient will be what defines ongoing success. We believe that truly connecting with guests is what will continue to drive our business and popularity one table at a time. 

Keen to learn how Waitrr can benefit your cafe or restaurant? Contact us here:

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