Though we now know him as one of Australia’s most familiar faces in food, Manu Feildel’s journey to entrepreneurial success has been more of a rollercoaster than you may think. Manu joined the First Act podcast to share the biggest lessons he’s learned from business success … and failure.

You may not know this but Manu Feildel is a third-generation chef with a long history in business – and it hasn’t all been smooth sailing.

Long before finding TV fame on the Aussie reality cooking show, My Kitchen Rules, Manu completed his apprenticeship in some of London’s most famous fine dining establishments and headed up three-hatted restaurants in Sydney. He and his wife now run a popular Sydney events space, La Botanique, and Manu has a fresh, gourmet sauce range, The Sauce By Manu, on Australian supermarket shelves.

“There were some successes and some failures,” Manu admits. “I think the success was about my character, my cooking, my joie de vivre. And the failures were the lack of knowledge in the business world. To make a dime out of restaurants today, it’s tough. There’s lots of costs, overheads are huge, staff is expensive. The food is becoming hugely expensive, as we know. So the margins are getting very, very small and that’s probably why I’m not in it anymore.”

“No regrets”

Manu reveals that during the heights of his TV success, the failure of his short-lived restaurant venture with fellow TV chef, George Calombaris – Le Grand Cirque in Melbourne – was both the beginning of a six-month depression and a positive catalyst for personal change.

“I was very lucky to have a great wife and great friends backing me up and reminding me that it was a necessary failure; it just didn’t work,” Manu says. “It was a kick in the guts and took years before I was confident with myself again, but you keep going and the trust comes back and you feel better about yourself. You know what they say – the show must go on.

“I don’t regret anything,” he continues. “I don’t regret any moments of my life because they’ve all been a lesson. But if I had to go back and add something to my life, I would do a quick business course to understand the difference between profit and turnover and tax. All of those things that I had to learn on the way and cost me lots of money – money I could have saved if I had a little bit more knowledge.”

Listen to Manu Feildel on the First Act podcast:

Celebrity won’t get you far in business

While he has no regrets, after some harsh business lessons, Manu decided it was time to create something for his long-term future.

It was his constant query, “Where’s the sauce?!”, which became his MKR judging catchcry, that inspired his latest business venture, The Sauce By Manu. Unimpressed by the available sauce ranges he found on supermarket shelves, Manu decided it was time to bring fabulous French cuisine sauces to our supermarkets and dinner tables.

It hasn’t been easy to get there, and Manu is the first to admit that his celebrity name was not enough to score a lucrative supermarket contract.

“I can tell you one thing, it didn’t matter if I was Manu Feildel or Joe Blow or anyone on this planet,” he reveals. “You have to knock on doors. Coles didn’t understand the product and I knocked on Coles’ door for many years. Every single year they refused, and this year they finally accepted.

“It’s funny because when Woolies got it, I thought that was it – that I didn’t have to work anymore,” he laughs. “But that’s where the job started. It’s incredible how much time we have to spend on this product to make sure that the sales are repeated and grow. It’s all about trusting in your brand, your product, and your business model, and just knock on doors.”

Saucy plans for retirement

After all his years of experience in a range of foodie environments, Manu says he is most excited by his The Sauce By Manu range, which he calls his ‘retirement plan’.

“I’ve put my face to a brand many times. Now I’ve got my own brand, the [aim] is to make sure that the customers know that this brand is mine – my sweat, my blood, my tears, my money. And that’s the difference between what I’ve done in the past. It’s a big message to put out there and it’s hard to communicate. It’s getting there now but it takes a lot of messaging, a lot of marketing, and a lot of sharing the knowledge.

“I’ve worked for 35 years … I’m mature, I’ve got the knowledge, I’ve got the understanding, and this product is now the success story. I want this to be my retirement plan. I think this is it, that I’m finally ripe to be successful with a food business. It’s been three years now and I think that the brand is finally anchored in the retail world.”

Like any young bootstrapped business, Manu and his small team are working hard to get to the next level of growth for The Sauce By Manu range. You can help by joining their crowdfunding efforts here.

Want to know more about Manu, his family foodie history, the ups and downs of TV fame, and his biggest lessons in business? Listen to First Act now! 

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This article was first published in April 2023.