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George Calombaris’ restaurant empire in voluntary administration

"To all of my team, I truly regret it has come to this," says former MasterChef judge.

Former MasterChef judge George Calombaris has confirmed his restaurant empire MADE Establishment into voluntary administration.

It comes after Calombaris put his Toorak mansion on sale.

500 employees are believed to be affected by the move, following staff underpayments of nearly $8 million.

Last year 10 announced all three MasterChef judges would not be returning in 2020, replaced by Andy Allen, Melissa Leong and Jock Zonfrillo.

9 Responses

  1. Yes he did the wrong thing by his employees but boy has he paid the price. Seems he is being treated as the devil yet many other high profile restaurants and companies have done the same and in some instances by a greater amount yet they hardly get a mention. How many times does he have to apologise and try to make things right? I feel sorry for him but I feel a greater sorrow for all the employees who have lost their jobs.

    1. Completely agree.
      Seems like his company a) self-reported and b) have actually paid all the back pay.

      A massive contrast to other restaurant chains who have a less high profile chef within them, and also to Dinner By Heston which looks like it’s being liquidated before anyone has received a cent in back pay – with only a string of shell companies in tax havens to chase.

      Credit to George for taking ownership of the error and not being afraid to front up and do his best to do the right thing.

      I still don’t think he personally would have had anything at all to do with the underpayment, but he’s easier for newspapers to point at that whoever the head of HR at MADE was.

    2. What about Woolworths and their massive underpayments? It’s the media knocking the tall poppy who is to blame and the current “cancel culture” that’s so toxic on social media. Feel sorry for the people out of work and feel in some way for George as well as he has admitted to his mistakes and fixed the problem, only to lose everything in the end anyway.

    3. yes, those many other high profile restaurants and companies are also run by terrible people. and yes, the true victims in this are those people who are now out of a job, they have paid the price for his incompetence (or deliberate scam), thus has it always been.

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