What is Gordon Ramsay's net worth and salary?
Gordon Ramsay is a British chef, restaurateur, writer, television personality, and food critic who has a net worth of $220 million. Gordon Ramsay began his culinary career in the 1980s, training under notable chefs in London and Paris. In 1998, he opened his first restaurant, Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, which quickly earned three Michelin stars.
Ramsay's empire grew to include numerous restaurants worldwide, ranging from fine dining to casual eateries. However, he's perhaps best known for his television career, which began in the UK with shows like "Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares" and "Hell's Kitchen." These programs, along with their American adaptations, catapulted him to international fame. His explosive temper and colorful language became his trademark, but his genuine passion for food and mentoring aspiring chefs also shone through. Other popular shows include "MasterChef," "Hotel Hell," and "24 Hours to Hell and Back."
Beyond television, Ramsay has authored several cookbooks, established a charity foundation, and even competed in ironman triathlons. Despite controversies and setbacks, including restaurant closures and lawsuits, Ramsay remains a dominant figure in the culinary world, known for his high standards and no-nonsense approach to cooking.
Salary Highlights
Gordon Ramsay's salary per episode is $225,000. He typically earns around $45 million per year from his media and restaurant empire. Between June 2017 and June 2018, Gordon earned north of $60 million. Between June 2018 and June 2019, he earned $65 million. In mid-July 2019, Gordon sold a 50% stake in his North American holding company to Lion Capital. Lion plans to spend $100 million launching 100 Gordon Ramsay restaurants in the United States between 2020 and 2025.
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Early Life
Gordon James Ramsay was born November 8, 1966, in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, Scotland. When he was five, his family moved to England, and he was raised in Stratford-upon-Avon. He is the second of four children. His family moved constantly when he was a child due to the aspirations and professional setbacks of his father. His father was a sometimes violent alcoholic and womanizer. At the age of 16, Ramsay moved out of his family's home and into an apartment of his own. As a teen, Ramsay was quite good at football/soccer as a teen but his playing days were cut short by injury. By this time, Ramsay had already developed an interest in cooking. At 19, he enrolled in the Hotel Management program at North Oxfordshire Technical College.
Restaurant Career
In the mid-1980s, Ramsay worked at the Wroxton House Hotel as a commis chef. From there, he went on to run the kitchen and 60-seat dining room at the Wickham Arms. He then moved to London, where he worked in a series of restaurants before landing a job working for the infamously temperamental chef Marco Pierre White at Harvey's. He worked at Harvey's for two years and ten months before growing tired of White's "rages and the bullying and violence." Ramsay e decided to study French cuisine and went to work for Albert Roux and Le Gavroche in Mayfair, where he met Jean-Claude Breton, now his maitre d-hotel at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay. After working at Le Gavroche for a year, Roux invited Ramsay to work with him as his number two at Hotel Diva, a ski resort in the French Alps. From there, then 23-year-old Ramsay moved to Paris to work with Guy Savoy and Joel Robuchon, both Michelin-starred chefs. He continued his training in France for three years.
After a sabbatical for a year as a private chef on a yacht, Ramsay returned to London and was offered the head chef position under three-Michelin-starred chef Pierre Koffman at La Tante Claire in Chelsea. Not long after, his old boss, Marco Pierre White, offered to give him the head chef job (in exchange for a 10% share) at the Rossmore, which Ramsay renamed Aubergine and won his first Michelin star 14 months later. In 1997, Aubergine received its second Michelin star. Ramsay left the partnership in the summer of 1998 over disagreements about the direction the company should go in.
That same year, Ramsay opened his own restaurant called Restaurant Gordon Ramsay in London's Chelsea neighborhood. In 2001, the restaurant gained its third Michelin star, making Ramsay the first Scotsman to achieve that feat.
From there, his empire expanded rapidly. He opened (and closed) a number of celebrated restaurants, launched his U.S.-based TV show "Hell's Kitchen," became a feature on the Food Network, and conquered the world one dinner plate at a time. He has restaurants in Dubai, Tokyo, London, New York City, Ireland, Canada, and, until 2015, in West Hollywood at the celebrated London Hotel on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles.
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Television Career
Ramsay's first foray into television was via two documentaries: 1998's "Boiling Point" and 2000's "Beyond Boiling Point." He appeared on "Faking It" in 2001, helping the prospective chef, a burger flipper, learn the trade. The episode won the BAFTA in 2001 for Best Factual TV Moment. In 2004, he appeared in two British television series, "Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares" and "Hell's Kitchen." In 2005, the Fox network brought Ramsay to American audiences with a U.S. version of "Hell's Kitchen." A U.S. version of "Kitchen Nightmares" was also aired on Fox. "Gordon Ramsay's 24 Hours to Hell and Back" replaced "Kitchen Nightmares" on Fox.
In 2010, Ramsay served as a producer and judge on the U.S. version of "MasterChef." He starred in a travelogue about his visit to India, "Gordon's Great Escape," followed by a series set in Asia. He hosted the series "Ramsay's Best Restaurant," which was the first UK series by Ramsay's own production company, One Potato Two Potato. Ramsay joined several other celebrity chefs in the 2010 series "The Big Fish Fight," where he, along with fellow chef Jamie Oliver and a few others, spent time on a trawler boat to raise awareness about the discarding of hundreds of thousands of saltwater fish.
In March 2012, Fox announced Ramsay's fourth series for the Fox network, "Hotel Hell;" the series is similar to "Kitchen Nightmares." Some of his more recent works include 2021's "Gordon Ramsay's Bank Balance" and "Gordon, Gino & Fred Go Greek," and 2022's "Next Level Chef," "Gordon Ramsay's Future Food Stars," and "Gordon Ramsay: Uncharted Showdown."
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Personal Life & Inheritance Plans
He married Cayetana (Tana) Elizabeth Hutcheson, a Montessori-trained schoolteacher, in 1996. They have five children: Megan (1998), twins Jack and Holly (2000), Matilda (2002), and Oscar (2019). The couple splits their time between Wandsworth Common, London, and Los Angeles.
In a 2017 interview, Gordon explained his plan to mostly leave his kids out of his will:
"I've never been really turned on about the money…That's not my number one objective, and that's reflected in the way the kids are brought up…It's definitely not going to them, and that's not in a mean way; it's to not spoil them…The only thing I've agreed with [wife] Tana is they get a 25% deposit on a flat, but not the whole flat."
Ramsay's parenting philosophy extends to more than just his last will and testament. His desire not to spoil his kids also extends to their shared travel arrangements, according to him:
"They don't sit with us in first class…They haven't worked anywhere near hard enough to afford that. At that age, at that size, you're telling me they need to sit in first class? No, they do not. We're really strict on that…I turn left with Tana and they turn right and I say to the chief stewardess, 'Make sure those little f—— don't come anywhere near us, I want to sleep on this plane.' I worked my f—— arse off to sit that close to the pilot and you appreciate it more when you've grafted for it."
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Real Estate & Car Collection
Ramsay is a car enthusiast and Ferrari lover and has a sizable collection, including a Ferrari LaFerrari painted in Grigio Ferro, a Ferrari 488 Spider, a Ferrari 812 Superfast, an Aston Martin DBS Superleggera, a McLaren Senna, and Porsche 918 Spyder.
In 2012, Ramsay purchased a $6.75 million home in Bel-Air, Los Angeles. The 7,413-square-foot mansion has five bedrooms, six bathrooms, a swimming pool, and, of course, a state-of-the-art luxury kitchen.
He also owns a home in London, which was purchased in 2002 for $3.5 million, and at least three homes, purchased for a combined total of $13 million in the English seaside town of Fowey. His most impressive property in Fowey was purchased in 2015 for around $6 million. He then spent a great deal of money on renovations, including a large pool with a transparent wall that looks out to the ocean. The transparent wall alone cost around $100,000.
In early 2023, it was revealed that Ramsay purchased Matt Hancock's girlfriend Gina Coladangelo's former home in London, reportedly all cash, amid the news that Tana is pregnant with the couple's sixth child.
