Courtesy of Emerge PR
Long hours in exchange for a handsome salary is a common trade-off made by those in banking. But after three years of "brutal" analyst work for Deutsche Bank, Jonathan Recanati was ready to pack it all in and strike out on his own.
"Very often in a bank a lot of people are out for themselves. It's mainly about the money and what bonus you're going to get," Recanati tells Fortune. “It just didn't feel like I fit in. I looked at the more senior people and I thought: ‘I don't want to be you’."
While “slaving away” from the early hours until late and eating three meals a day at his desk—dominated by soggy shop-bought sandwiches—Recanati says he had his lightbulb moment.
“I realized there was a major gap in the market," Recanati recalls. And that formed the early premise for his business, Farmer J, a fast food chain that serves locally sourced, healthy food.
"Most of the people I spoke to told me not to do it," he laughs.
Inspired by Chipotle
Recanati drew inspiration from the triumph of fast-casual brands in the U.S., notably Chipotle, and started working on his brand proposition while still employed at Deutsche Bank.Just a month after tossing the towel in on his banking job at 30-years-old, he impressed a private investor with the promise that Farmer J could replicate the Mexican grill's success and started trialing menu items at pop-up supper clubs.
https://fortune.com/europe/2024/04/06/farmer-j-jonathan-recanati-work-life-balance/
