Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics

Working Papers,
University of Aarhus, Aarhus School of Business, Department of Economics

No 10-2: Stars War in French Gastronomy: Prestige of Restaurants and Chefs’ Careers

Olivier Gergaud (), Valérie Smeets () and Frédéric Warzynski ()
Additional contact information
Olivier Gergaud: University of Reims, Postal: University of Reims, Reims, France
Valérie Smeets: Department of Economics, Aarhus School of Business, Postal: The Aarhus School of Business, Aarhus University, Department of Economics, Frichshuset Hermodsvej 22, 8230 Åbyhøj , Denmark
Frédéric Warzynski: Department of Economics, Aarhus School of Business, Postal: The Aarhus School of Business, Aarhus University, Department of Economics, Frichshuset Hermodsvej 22, 8230 Åbyhøj , Denmark

Abstract: In this paper, we analyze the careers from a sample of more than 1,000 top French chefs over more than twenty years and link it to the success or reputation of the restaurants where they have worked. This allows us to test what are the determinants of success but also to investigate the dynamics of performance and reputation, stressing the importance of the quality of apprenticeships, mentoring and entrepreneurship spirit. We find that the prestige of the restaurant where individuals work is on average declining along the career, and that the quality of apprenticeship is strongly related to the future success as chef. We also find that prices of restaurants with higher reputation are more sensitive to bad signals.

Keywords: No; keywords

JEL-codes: J24

24 pages, January 1, 2010

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10-02_vasfwa.pdf PDF-file

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