Chef's Counter Dining Room 1

Chef's Counter is a hospitality events company with a difference. 

Launched in the summer of 2023, Chef's Counter has run a series of sold out public dining events in unique, iconic and underused venues around Sheffield. In addition, we have also established 'Business Bites' our bespoke corporate hospitality service attracting bookings from across South and West Yorkshire.  

Since our first invite only event in June 2023 and our latest sold out Saturday Night Dinner event in February 2024, Chef's Counter have cooked for over 2000 people, won the collaboration excellence category at Sheffield Business Awards, had a mention from Jay Rayner in the Guardian, generated thousands of pounds additional revenue for local charities and community groups, created supported employment for 8 people overcoming barriers to enter the workplace (ranging from overcoming substance misuse, homelessness to living with long term mental and physical health conditions) and finally cooked alot of delicious food!  

We now need some help. So far hiring spaces on an ad hoc basis from local charities and community groups has been fine in terms of meeting the demand for our services. The reality now is we're getting busier and busier with more people booking onto our expanded public events programme and companies taking up our delicious business bites offering. So we've decided we need a permanent space that we can use as and when we need it rather than fitting round other groups. 

So, what's the plan? 

This year is about establishing Chef's Counter as a regional business, so in our search for a permanent site we've spread our wings a little bit further than Sheffield. We also want to use this opportunity to expand our events programme, create more jobs and bring some life back to areas that have been left behind a bit. We also want to create a model that is easy to replicate in other towns and cities as we continue to grow and expand in the years ahead. 

We're pleased to announce that we have found the perfect space in Rotherham. After viewing several locations over the last couple of months we came across Unit 8, part of the Imperial Building in the centre of Rotherham. We are now in a position to turn the space below into our first Chef's Counter dining room. The space will include a production & development kitchen to service all our upcoming South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire events as well as opportunity for guests to enjoy our food onsite.  

We are now in the process of raising the money we need to make this a reality ahead of launching what we see as being the first of many Chef's Counter dining rooms that bring empty retail units back into use, creating good quality jobs, upskilling people and providing incredible hospitality to local town and city centres.