The Beauty of Independent Businesses

I always say hospitality is a team sport, but this weekend reminded me that small business is basically an extreme sport involving customer service, van hire, stock runs, and someone’s mum bringing emergency bacon.

On Saturday, my son and our Head Chef Dilwyn from The Chester Townhouse took their food truck to Chester Regatta. For context, the two of them run a food truck business together, doing festivals, events and weddings. This weekend they weren’t just one of the food vendors at the regatta, they were the only food vendor there, which was a fantastic gig for them, but also a big responsibility.

And because apparently feeding people wasn’t enough, this was also their first time running a bar alongside the food truck.

People see the finished version. They see the truck, the food, the drinks, the smiling faces, the queue, the atmosphere. What they don’t always see is the absolute circus that happens behind the scenes to get it there.

In preparation for the event, we borrowed a mobile bar from Hotel Wrexham. Scott had to hire a van. Drinks were ordered into The Townhouse. Stock had to be sorted, equipment had to be moved, lists had to be checked, probably rechecked, and then still something will always happen because that is just the law of events.

Then on the day, the village appeared.

My daughter Jess came down to help. Dilwyn’s friend Celine came along to support the boys. Everyone had a job. Everyone got stuck in. Because in a small business, everyone does everything. You are the marketing department, the logistics department, the pot wash, the emergency driver, and sometimes even the chef.

It was a brilliant day.

Busy, fun, chaotic in the way only hospitality can be. People enjoying themselves, being fed, having a drink, sitting by the river, and the team doing everything they could to make it work.

But of course, there were hiccups.

First, they sold out of bacon.

So there’s a phone call. My wife cooks more bacon off at The Townhouse and brings it over. Crisis avoided.

Then later in the day, they ran out of chips.

So I go and pick up more chips and drop them off.

Again, crisis avoided.

And this is the bit people don’t always understand about independent businesses. It is rarely smooth. It is rarely glamorous. It is rarely someone stood with a clipboard calmly watching the day unfold.

It is people mucking in. It is borrowing equipment. It is calling in favours. It is family members giving up their Saturday. It is friends turning up to help. It is someone jumping in a van. It is someone cooking bacon in a hotel kitchen and rushing it across Chester because customers are waiting and you don’t want to let anyone down.

That is the reality.

And it made me think about family businesses and independent businesses more widely. We talk about them all the time, especially in hospitality, but I don’t think we always give enough credit to what actually goes into them.

At the start of 2025, there were around 5.6 million small businesses in the UK, making up over 99% of the total business population. That is not a side note. That is the backbone of this country.

Behind so many of those businesses is a family, a friendship, a partnership, a team, and usually at least one person saying, “It’ll be fine,” when it absolutely does not feel fine.

But somehow, it is fine.

Because people pull together.

That is what I love about hospitality and independent business. It is not perfect. It is not polished all the time. It is raw, real, exhausting, funny, stressful, and brilliant.

The big businesses might have systems, departments and big budgets. Independent businesses have people who care enough to make it happen anyway.

And that is powerful.

Saturday at Chester Regatta was a perfect example of that. A food truck, a first bar, borrowed equipment, hired vans, emergency bacon, emergency chips, family, friends, chefs, daughters, wives, everyone playing their part.

Customers probably had no idea what was going on behind the scenes.

And that is exactly the point.

Because when small businesses are at their best, they make the chaos invisible.

They just get on with it.

And honestly, that deserves more credit than it gets.