Explore Will Lawrence's journey in the Caterers Industry

When I hear ‘rootless’, I think of someone without roots, without an established family they can go to for help or a profession that has been laid out for you. It’s about having to stand on your own, dig your feet and find your own way because there might not be many resources to revert back to. – Will Lawrence

I am 30 years old. I was born and raised in Bronx, New York. I grew up with a single mother and my sister, Michelle. My mother and father split around the time I was born so my dad was in and out of my life a lot but later on we developed our own special relationship. My father is a great man but not having your dad around was very common where I grew up. A lot of my friends didn’t have their dads in their lives. Me and my friends would hang out, playing, my mum had to work. Later on, my mum got disabled so she was home more but that brought a new set of challenges. When mum wasn’t working, we were depending on social security to get by but I never once needed anything. My life was great. Looking back, I realized my mum didn’t have too much to work with but we had everything we needed. I had a great childhood with my family, full of fun and laughs. I remember around middle school that I wanted to start working. My friends had sneakers while I was buying fake ones. I wanted to buy real stuff. So, I got my first job as a busboy. I was 14, working off the books. Later on, I winded up staying at restaurants and before I knew it, I was almost 18 years old and I was running the front of the house of this popular Italian restaurant in my neighborhood. I did that for a couple more years, went in and out of catering. I thought of opening up a restaurant one day but I didn’t know a thing about the back of the house. I knew how to cook and, during my breaks, I was always going to the back, help out the kitchen guys. I am mixed Italian and Puerto Rican. So, I would go in the kitchen, annoy the guys there with questions, speak Spanish with them and they would teach me. I thought I liked that a bit more compared to what I was doing outside. One day I took a tour in the culinary school and it clicked. Sometimes hardships give you a sense of character. Everybody wants to be the hero of their story and overcome challenges. – Will Lawrence

I was working in Italian American restaurants, “neighborhood joints” as they were called. When I took that tour at the culinary school with the white walls, the beautiful polished stainless steel, all the chefs in their pressed white linens, I was overwhelmed. I had never seen that before. I had never been to a Michelin start restaurant or eaten somewhere fancy before. When I saw that, I realized it was a serious profession. I looked at those chefs as if I was looking at a CEO or a lawyer or doctor because they were treated with a lot of respect. I was seeing people operating around them and they were controlling the entire kitchen. It really blew me away and made me want to become a chef. – Will Lawrence

It’s imperative. When I look back, I think it was such a gift that I found what I wanted to do at a young age because the trajectory is limitless, it is compounded every year but I started early, so it’s just been growing exponentially. In culinary school I met people in their late 20s, 30s, and mid 40s changing careers because they had always wanted to be a chef. They had worked for many years in companies they didn’t want to. I feel very grateful I was exposed young and it clicked. If you show a young kid enough things, one thing will eventually click. Exposure is everything. – Will Lawrence

I tried to appease the normal outlook that every parent wants, to go to college. I went at Long Island University, did a year there and it was absolutely horrible. I think I got only two credits for an entire year there. I was trying to work, have fun, didn’t like that structure of life. It wasn’t for me, I was just trying to appease what my mother expected of me so that she could be proud. Eventually, I gave everything up and was itching to get back to Bronx to start working again. I finished that year and that’s when took the trip to culinary school. I was 20 years old and stayed there for two years and halfway through it I got my first job as a cook. – Will Lawrence

Culinary school is not completely necessary if you start working in restaurants at a young age, try your best to move up but it does help with teaching you the ‘why’. It depends on the type of learner you are. I am the type that needs to know why I am doing something a certain way. In culinary school they explain everything, the techniques, where they came from, how French techniques are used in a lot of these great restaurants even if they’re not doing French cuisine. You learn how to hold a knife, how to make a certain cut, what flavors pair with what, how to cook a piece of fish beautifully, the temperatures that are correct for each protein. That’s what the culinary school does. It gives you discipline, structure, and a sense of philosophy you can look back to. I advise it for whoever is able to do it. It will make your experience better and catapult you more after that. At the end of the day, it was school and my track record with school is not the best. Nonetheless, it was great, I was in the middle of New York City, 20 years old, cooking. After school we wanted to go to the best restaurants and bars as students. I did amazingly on all my practical tests, paper tests not as much. I graduated and started working immediately. – Will Lawrence

My first cooking job was in a restaurant called Joanne’s in the Upper West side. An amazing chef called Art Smith was opening it with Lady Gaga’s parents. In my mind I thought that if there was one night he was going to be there, it had to be the opening night. I went there, finally met the chef, got in his ear and told him I was in culinary school. He immediately set me up for an interview a couple of days later. I came back to the restaurant and passed the interview. While I was working, I was in culinary school too. It turned out to be an amazing experience. They wanted me to stay there full time so Lady Gaga’s mother sent a letter to the school’s president asking if I could graduate early so that I could work more but I finished the school. I stayed with the restaurant until I graduated. I had long days, starting from 10am to 11pm or midnight. It was a great first impression to New York dining and a lot of celebrities would show to give the place some love so I got a lot of exposure there. After a year, being starstruck kind of went away. It was a great experience because it built my character in the kitchen a little bit. – Will Lawrence

After that, I had to decide what kind of restaurant I wanted to be at. A friend of mine who recently passed away called Axel asked me if I wanted to work with him in Westchester County. The restaurant was called BLT, in Ritz Carlton and it required a higher end, more technical, visually pleasing, fine dining. I went there and loved it. It was a breath of fresh air, we were cooking for hundreds of people every night, different types of temperatures of the steaks, different fish, butchering whole animals. It was a great experience. At that time, I had never lived with my father before. This opportunity was in Westchester and I wanted to find out what it was like. So, that started a whole new chapter of my life. It came full circle. I had always wondered what kind of man I would have been if my father had been around and I wanted to see for myself. – Will Lawrence

After the job at BLT, I go back and forth in three more restaurants. I am always going up whether it’s a matter of position or a better or higher caliber restaurant. At one point, I was working for this company, was ready to leave and was in a crossroad. I had two potential job offers. One was for Google headquarters, I was going to be a corporate chef position with an amazing salary, supplement benefits on top of it. At the same time, the three Michelin star “Per Se” comes back at me saying that they want me to work there as well and they’re paying minimum wage because it’s such a privilege to work at a three Michelin star restaurant. After you leave there, your career is kind of set in stone. Back then, I was trying to propose to my girlfriend, we were making plans, living together and it was a very difficult decision. My fiancée kind of made the decision for me because she got another job. She supported me. The way I look at it, instead of being content in a cushion job at Google, I winded up in probably one of the hardest years professionally in one of the world’s best restaurants. – Will Lawrence

There are no games, everybody understands what it means to go to work, there is no lax. You’re at work 45 minutes before you’re supposed to be because you need to iron your pants, shine your shoes, sharpen your knives, make sure everything is pressed and that you’re clean shaved. If not, they’re going to kick you out of the kitchen and there’s a stack of resumes on the desk of people who will gladly take your place, globally. I was probably one of two or three people that were actually resident New Yorkers who weren’t there just because of the job. We’re talking about people from UK, Japan, Australia, Italy. You’re constantly reminded how many people want that opportunity and you’re grateful to be there. No matter how hard the day is, you roll with the punches because you understand what it means for your life. I came from running kitchens. When I got there, I was peeling potatoes and everybody goes through that. It doesn’t matter where you came from or who you were before that. They all start at the same level. It builds respect. Everyone looks at each other respectfully because we all went through the same ritual together. – Will Lawrence

At first it was surreal especially when you hear everybody’s story. I was just a kid from the Bronx working at Italian restaurants. You have to get used to that hurdle of not deserving to be there after a while. It was very militant. You know exactly what you are doing in a certain day, there are different departments for everything, you report to people, there’s a hierarchy. You can spend three hours working on just one ingredient. There are people washing mushrooms all day because they pick each individual mushroom, pick the sediment from it, double check everything and put redundancies in place. It’s not as glamorous it may seem from outside. You may be there for years before you’re even the person putting the food on the plate. So, it’s about earning the respect, learning the process of everything before you get to that final point. In their mind, the cooking is easy, it’s all the stuff that comes before that, your philosophy towards food, your attitude towards what you’re doing that matter. So, no stars are born overnight there. – Will Lawrence

So, when I left “Per Se” it was more due to financial reasons. At that time, I wanted to start a family, propose to my fiancée and needed to pay the bills. It was a great experience, I stayed there for a year. That was my mark, I wanted to stay there for at least one year. I give that advice to any chef. If you want an experience at a three Michelin star restaurant, try your best to do it as young as possible, when you don’t have much responsibilities because it will take over your life. That will be your life for the number of years you’re set to do it. You have to balance everything. – Will Lawrence

I just found an ad on LinkedIn; it was for a sous chef position. It doesn’t really matter what position the advertisement is for; you’re going to start at the bottom. If you see any sort of vacancy, you just go in there and be persistent. If you find a chef you follow on Instagram, DM them, tell them you’re willing to take a flight to New York because those opportunities happen all the time. People will take a chance on you if they think you’re passionate. – Will Lawrence

You might have a verbal interview over the phone or in person but it all comes down to you and the kitchen so it’s a working interview. I know a lot of professions where it doesn’t make sense to put somebody to work and judge him. People can sometimes talk the talk, have the gift of gab and get the job. You won’t get the job if you don’t deserve it, especially in a high-profile kitchen. It’s very much practical. That’s what I love about it, it’s an equalizer. It doesn’t matter if your 6’5, 200lbs or if you’re 5’2 110lbs soaking wet. If you can cook, you’ll get the job. That’s why it is so egalitarian in the cooking world. You’ll find chefs that run the best kitchens that are young petite women who are telling grown men what to do and they’re doing it because they respect them, they understand they know what they’re talking. I love that feeling, it’s smoking mirrors, you can’t hide behind anything, you can either do it or can’t. Chefs are usually a band of misfits, not a lot of people say they want to be working 16-hour days in a hot kitchen. You have to be a bit of a masochist to do it. – Will Lawrence

When I was at the three Michelin star kitchen, the showtime was at 6 a.m. There’s a pre ritual before you even walk in the door. So, I used to leave my house around 4 a.m., got to work by taking the train from Bronx down to the city and got to the restaurant by 5 a.m. When I got to work, I had to shave. There was only one iron and I had to make sure to iron my apron, chef coat and shirt before anybody else. I had to get my tools in order, see if anything needs to be sharpened and then I walked in at 6 a.m. From 6 a.m. to probably around noon, it’s just head down working. If you’re not working, you’re being asked what you are doing because you’re not working. You get a quick 30minute meal and get right back to it. Sometime you won’t get down until 10pm so we’re talking about 12-, 13- or 14-hour workday. That does not happen only in Michelin star restaurants. If you’re running any kitchen, the margins of the restaurants aren’t that high. So, if you’re the head chef, you’re wearing a lot of hats and you’re going to be there all day, every day. It’s glamourous, the end results are worth it and those great moments are beautiful. However, it takes a lot of grit and passion about it because that’s what’s going to carry you over. Nowadays the chef’s life is being glamourized, the chef’s out in the front but most don’t do it for the recognition. They understand if their food is good or not and put it out there, just want people to enjoy themselves. A lot of chefs, including me, don’t like to cook for themselves often unless I’m experimenting. My joy comes from cooking for somebody else. The cooking and making other people happy go hand in hand. We’re basically nurturing other people, giving a bit of ourselves to someone else. – Will Lawrence

There are some restaurants that may be chains that provide knives for their cooks but mostly if you work for a newer fine dining restaurant, each chef is responsible for his own knives. The last thing you want is someone touching your knives. The sharpness of your knife determines how your day is going to go so definitely have your own equipment. I would recommend to go to culinary school after high school. There is the International French Culinary Centre, the Culinary Institute of America up in Hyde Park which has a whole campus where you can get your bachelor. If you’re young and you know out of high school that you want to be a chef, don’t waste time. Go to the best restaurant you can and offer to wash the dishes. I used to go from door to door to restaurants saying I would work for free before labor laws started getting so strict. Now you have to pay someone just for an interview. In my point of view as someone who is older and running kitchens, if somebody came and offers to wash dishes today, I would put that person on. That hunger and drive shows a lot. People are always itching to give some of themselves away. We gravitate towards having a mentee, it’s your best move to go out and do it. Obviously, you can go back and send as many resumes as you can but if you don’t have the experience, show up as much as you can. – Will Lawrence

I practiced a lot. Culinary school was a great help but if you don’t have that, you can go on YouTube. You can look at different techniques, at least learn the vocabulary behind the kitchen, the vernacular and when you get there, people will be amazed by what you know. Doing that will at least knock half the work down. When you see someone doing something, you’ll know what they’re doing and are not starting from scratch. You’d be doing that in order to put yourself in a position that when the opportunity comes, you’ll be ready. So, after you’ve studied food terms, pick out your top 10 favorite restaurants and get to the door. Start as a dishwasher, cook or anything like that. You’ll be ready for the opportunity to do something more and you’ll be in position to seize it. – Will Lawrence

When there’s nothing else to be learned, it’s a good time to go. It’s a progressing field, what’s cool today is not going to be in two years. It also depends on what your niche is. If you want to run a sandwich shop, work in that kind of shop until you know how to run it. If you want to be a more refined dining chef, have more creativity and become an executive chef you have to firstly do your due diligence before you accept the job. If it doesn’t seem like you’re learning there to begin with, you should find another job. I give every job a year or two but it depends. All that due diligence comes before you get the job and you know you need to leave when you’ve learned everything you could have. – Will Lawrence

I was reaching the end of my time at Per Se, the salary wasn’t good but the experience was amazing. I had always thought of what the life of a private chef was. At that point, I had been working in kitchens for nine years. I remember when I got out of culinary school and looked at the highest paid chefs, private chefs were on top. They make six figures and go around the world. When I graduated, I hit up a private chef agency and said I wanted to become one. They asked me about my work experience and I had nothing. They told me I had to work a little bit. Fast forward nine years, I was working at a three Michelin star restaurant, I actually kept in touch with e recruiter. I didn’t get the job initially when I applied but kept in touch for a decade, and invited him to restaurants I worked at. I explained to him that I was ready to leave Per Say. He told me that I should send him my CV. Within a week I got the opportunity to work for a well-known Oscar award-winning actor here in New York. That’s where my life kind of took off. They loved me, I winded up making the transition and I became a private chef. – Will Lawrence

It’s not for all the chefs. You can get the chef from the best restaurant in the world and he may not be able to work in a kitchen with children running around, or changing their minds at the last minute. You have to be humble, flexible. It’s like waiting for the owners of the restaurant every day. So, this is the VIP every day. I have to base my whole menu based on what their preferences are. I have to take their dietary restrictions, allergies and their family schedule through the day into consideration. I might have staff I need to cook for as well. It’s a completely different world. For a client, I would go in at 6 am, make breakfast for the kids before going to school, make sure the parents ate, grab groceries, prepare lunch, send lunch out to the children at school and then stay for dinner as well. It was another 16, 18-hour day. I also got to take private jets and stay in huge mansions. Some of them even gave me the keys to stay there with my fiancée over the weekend alone. There are a lot of perks but it takes a lot of hard work and time. You are willing to do it because you’re compensated very well. A lot of chefs see it as selling out but some of the best chefs in the world, you’ve probably never even tasted their food because they are cooking for someone specifically. Everything is discrete, non-disclosures are mandatory but you have to realize you’re a worker in someone’s house. Those lines can be blurred sometimes you have to be conscious of the fact that you’re there for a purpose and provide a service for this family and nothing more. So, be cordial, nice to each other but you can’t step over that boundary. Depending on what kind of family you’re working for, that might be a no-go. – Will Lawrence

It definitely is important in the cooking world especially if you’re into the Michelin world or fine dining in general. There are not many of them so they exchange is information. Just like in any other industry, if you leave somewhere and are not providing any references, they may do their due diligence and find out. It’s about not burning any bridges, being very cordial and be happy for other people’s success is what it boils down to. A lot of other chefs get competitive but we’re in a new era now where people are collaborating, have found out they can do more together. You have to maintain relationships especially in the culinary world in New York because you can never know what opportunity might come. – Will Lawrence

I think I made something like mac and cheese and fried chicken. If you want to be a private chef, you have to know that every client is different, some have strict diets, some want what they grew up eating. If they wanted to go and eat at a Michelin start restaurant, they would have gone out. Instead, they chose to stay home for a reason so some people don’t want overcomplicated food. There are times when I’m making multiple course Michelin star foods but there are also times when I’m making mac and cheese, cornbread and fried chicken. You’ve got to have a very big knowledge of different cooking styles when you’re working in someone’s home because you have the same client every day and you can start being repetitive. You have to keep venturing out, trying new food. I was never big into Indian food and now I am because I have to throw it in the rotation. It forces you to go out there and expand your knowledge. Everyone thinks I cook a lot at home but if my fiancée is not cooking, I’m probably ordering out. Imagine if you’re an accountant, you come home and somebody asks you to do the taxes, you want somebody else to do it for you. I appreciate it so much when people cook for me. They are sometimes stressed when they’re cooking and I’m just there happily waiting to eat my food. I give them a lot of respect for doing that because I know the hard work behind nurturing someone else. I love it, I’m not judgmental at all, I appreciate it. – Will Lawrence

When I was young being a chef, the last thing I worried about was being big on social media and I worked. If I didn’t know someone personally, they probably didn’t know what I worked. I was only focused on doing the ground work. It’s a gift and a curse because now that I look back and have my own private chef company, I wish I had spent more time investing in myself as a brand. So, you have to find that balance. You need to work hard, put your head down, go incognito for five years and be a subject matter expert in your field. You’ll come out with so much knowledge and information to give away to other people and can finally start working on your branding. Don’t do one or the other two too early, you need to put in that work because when you put in ten years in an industry, you’ll have an abundance of knowledge and can create content about whatever you want. – Will Lawrence

It’s everything. I feel like Instagram is the new website. If I tell someone that I’m a private chef they’ll immediately go on Instagram to look at my food even if they’re on their 50s. I think Instagram is a necessity, there is also TikTok, etc. You definitely have to maintain your professional friends on LinkedIn, develop as many connections and link up with as many people as you can but don’t forget to brand yourself and let the world know what you’re doing. – Will Lawrence

Try to incorporate what your day is like, don’t stress it too much, try to integrate your lifestyle into your life. Try to integrate your content into your lifestyle. If you’re already doing it, you’ll just document yourself doing it. You have to embody what you’re teaching. Live the life you’re telling people you’re living and it won’t be difficult to document it throughout the day. I take food photos, set up lights and everything because social media posts are very visual but people want to know about you sometimes. – Will Lawrence

I think that comes from personal strength. You have to be cool under pressure because by working in a high intense environment like the kitchen there will be good and bad days. Once I had put out a whole wedding and before you know it, there were 50 steaks coming back. Whether it was your mistake or not, everyone got the wrong order and you have to take a breath and solve it. Everyone who’s worked at a restaurant will know the battle between the front and back and one is blaming the other. It all comes from personal strength, you have to realize food is just food, analyze the situation you’re being dealt with and think of how to handle it. I don’t know if it comes from the way I grew up, different life experiences but a little bit of suffering lets you learn. You can always revert those moments so you can remember it’s not the end of the world. Do what you’ve got to do. – Will Lawrence

I probably would have done everything a little earlier. I would’ve gone to culinary school right after high school, applied at a really good Michelin restaurant when I was young so money wouldn’t have affected me much. So, don’t be afraid to take those risks young. It’s hard to figure out what you really want to do at a young age sometimes just give it a chance, take a tour at the culinary school, of the places you want to be at and see what will click. – Will Lawrence

I wouldn’t. I can’t see myself doing anything else. Being a chef and progressing to having my own business is exposing me to new things like marketing and investing. I think in a past life I might’ve been more of a business guy but you can integrate being a business person with anything now, it’s amazing. – Will Lawrence

If you’re self-centered, not a team player, can’t take criticism well, think you know it all, you shouldn’t be a chef. You get humbled every time someone is doing something new or better than you. You have to adapt, be willing to learn new things and understand that what you’ve been doing might not have been the right thing to do. – Will Lawrence

You can never know what’s going to happen. After I worked for that specific actor’s family instead of working for another family, Covid-19 happened and I lost my job. I was riding high, went from minimum wage to six figures. I was also planning a wedding because I had proposed to my girlfriend, checked off those things I had always wanted to do and lost my job. My income got slashed 75% at that time. So, at that point I was deciding what I was going to do, what I wanted to do. Restaurants were closed, people might have allowed me in their homes if I was extra careful. So, I started my own private chef business out of necessity. I started thinking that maybe I shouldn’t be for just one family. I could have more clients and be a little more reliable on myself because my whole income stream was dependable on one variable that was gone. The whole summer going to fall last year I was doing small events and gatherings in private homes. Towards the end of last year, I winded up getting my first big client, a pro NBA player that plays for one of New York’s basketball teams. It completely changed the trajectory for me. This time I got found by another person that works for him on LinkedIn and it led to a working interview. It’s just like when someone brings you in for a job, always just do what they want you to do. His main chef was looking to leave and he brought in. When you are being trained by the person you’re replacing who is more experienced, you pretty much want to be them when they’re not here. Then you can pretty much develop your working style. It worked for me. I got my first big client and am almost getting another one that plays with the football team. I had always wanted to open my own restaurant but this is what’s working and this is what I love. – Will Lawrence

I feel like everyone’s an expert now on different things. The advice I’d give to people is to do what feels right to you. Find the thing you want to do and become an expert in it. Eventually you’ll realize that there are people looking for your service. Keep it as simple as possible, you don’t need to overcomplicate things. If you don’t have the money to incorporate yourself, become an LLC or get a business account, you don’t need to. Develop your client base, the superfans that will tell all the people about your product and then everything will fall into place. The money will come flowing in so much that you won’t have enough time. That’s when you should incorporate and develop systems. It’s a good idea to have some systems ready to go in. if you’re not making anything off your product or service right now you don’t have to worry about an LLC. Develop your core and your foundation first. – Will Lawrence

Dropping out of college is a very difficult position to be in but step one is finding out what you’d rather do. It’s very hard to convince mum and dad you don’t want to go to school if you don’t have something else better to do. I would say that going to college is better than waiting around with nothing to do. It will put you in position to go around and try to figure it out. If you already know what you want to do and want to develop some sort of buzz or accolades, I would say to double down, full throttle, that maybe school isn’t the right thing for you. You firstly need to find out what your calling is because you might look back and think that the college education might have helped you. It may not be mandatory but you need to figure it out first and you’ll know more. Your parents will be happy regardless. – Will Lawrence