Paying Michelin Guide to Help Promote Your Tourism Can Be a Messy Business
Photo Credit: People sitting on chairs on a street in Jaffa, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel. Source: Unsplash / Yaroslav Lutsky
Skift Take
Cities are paying for Michelin to come, but people are divided on what this means for their restaurants. As the Michelin Guide expands with the help of tourism boards around the world, controversies continue around the guide's role in tourism marketing.
Israel's Tel Aviv could be the next stop for a Michelin Guide, following a series of inaugural editions released around different corners of the world last year. After years of planning, the Israeli Tourism Minister Haim Katz announced February 1 that the ministry would be moving forward with bringing the guide to the country for the first time.
The hoopla didn't come without its struggles. The minister previously received a slew of critiques from top chefs around the country when the estimated 1.5 million euros ($1.6 million) agreement was called back into reconsideration for whether it was the best use of tax money for Israeli citizens. While some chefs and restauranteurs see the Michelin as "a crazy engine" that drives "enormous effects" on tourism, others would rather decide what and when they eat without the stars' influence.
Allegations of bias and elitism have long surrounded Michelin Guide's activities across the world. Its criteria and selections have been controversial, to say the least. Michelin did not respond to Skift's request for a comment.
Described by famed chef Gordon Ramsay as the “Oscars of the restaurant industry,” the Michelin Guide is a best-selling guide to dining experiences around the world, and honors select restaurants with a stars system for their food quality. Highly coveted by chefs around the world, Michelin stars are powerful branding elements that transform restaurants and drive enormous tailwinds in gastro-tourism.
“With one Michelin star, you get about 20 percent more business. Two stars, you do about 40 percent more business, and with three stars, you'll do about 100 percent more business,” the master chef of the star game, the late Joël Robuchon, told Food & Wine magazine back in 2017. “So from a business point ... you can see the influence of the Michelin guide."
It is not uncommon for Michelin to be in some financial agreement with tourism boa
