Expanding Horizons: A Learning Journey to Copenhagen for Estonia and Tallinn's Top Restaurants

The host for the Estonian group, MAD Symposium, was founded in 2011 by René Redzepi, the world-famous chef and owner of restaurant noma. The organization aims to inspire and empower chefs, service staff, and food lovers to bring changes to the sector. According to Jack Muirhead of MAD Symposium, restaurant culture is a multi-layered phenomenon that encompasses everything from employees and partners to management, marketing, and social media. All of these topics were covered during the trip.

During the trip, participants had the unique opportunity to delve into Danish food philosophy, characterized by deeply rooted principles of sustainability. The success stories and growth strategies of Copenhagen entrepreneurs have made precision in sustainability, starting from sourcing materials to serving and company value-based management, the standard. This was confirmed by visits to the legendary coffee company Coffee Collective, the LOCA group's restaurant Almanak I Operaen, the plant bistro Baka d´Busk, and the Bib Gourmand restaurant The ARK.

Danish customers are no longer looking for sustainable restaurants because sustainability has become a given for them. It's purely a hygiene factor - garbage sorting and ensuring high quality are everyday activities. This is evidenced by the fact that Danish restaurants are no longer chasing various green labels – they have moved past that stage. The only coveted prize now is Michelin stars.

For ensuring popularity, trends and desirability have become more important than labels. The success story of the burger chain Gasoline Grill is based precisely on this. Owner Klaus Wittrup grew his empire from a small kiosk without compromising on quality. According to him, high-quality raw materials are the magic component that creates scarcity and thereby demand. Gasoline Grill has become a company that provides value to all partners, from food producers to real estate developers.

The experiences of the Estonian delegation were diverse, ranging from workshops and lectures on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) strategies to practical visits, such as seeing noma's food laboratory and Coffee Collective's coffee roasting factory. The latter included a meeting with the company's leader, Peter Dupont, who emphasized the importance of cooperation with partners, in this case, coffee producers from around the world. Coffee Collective has committed to paying a fair price for coffee so that expenses can be covered, and it's economically feasible to innovate, which is necessary due to climate change-induced needs to update agricultural models. Only through this can a company achieve good and sustainable cooperation, in addition to a good reputation, which is crucial for staying competitive.

Particularly noteworthy was the focus in Denmark on creating psychological safety in the workplace, acknowledging that employees are their most valuable asset. Solutions were sought to questions of how to create an environment where every employee feels valued and where making mistakes is part of the learning process.

The presentation on DEI strategies by anthropologist and consultant Elin Fern from the company Pronouns stood out. The presentation and subsequent workshops focused on organizational culture, aiming for inclusiveness, diversity, and equality. Culture is either deliberately created or it forms on its own. A culture that forms by itself may not take differences into account and can lead to difficult situations, including bullying, both among colleagues and in customer relations. A smart way to address DEI issues is to involve employees, focus on innovation, and create a modern workplace with essential agreements.

While the aim of the trip was to learn, the experience reinforced the belief among the traveling tourism professionals that Estonia and Tallinn's dining establishments have long been of international standard. The goal of the Copenhagen trip wasn't to become good, but to become even better.

20 years ago, the world knew nothing of Danish food or food culture. A representative from Copenhagen's tourism organization, Wonderful Copenhagen, explained how the country took a strategic approach to developing the sector, focusing on various important themes: chefs as personalities, raw materials, data, cooperation, agreements, etc. Today, the city's culinary fame is significant - fully 30% of foreign guests come to the Danish capital just for the food. However, it was also noted that this fame is limited to Copenhagen; people do not travel elsewhere just for the food. In this respect, Estonia certainly has a more exciting food landscape to offer beyond Tallinn.

Certainly, Estonian restaurant leaders returned with a wealth of knowledge on how to more boldly highlight their strengths and further emphasize sustainability and social cohesion in restaurant culture. The Danish success story will undoubtedly inspire the Estonian catering sector to develop and better utilize their strengths so that our restaurants can become even bigger attractions in larger cities like Tallinn and Tartu, as well as in smaller towns and regions.

Interestingly, one of the secrets to the great popularity of Copenhagen's restaurants is the tradition of eateries recommending other local restaurants to their guests. After all, a foreign guest won't dine at the same restaurant twice during their trip. Thus, we should take a lesson from the Danes, enjoy and recommend our colleagues' restaurants to guests!

Additional Information: The training trip organized by MAD Academy, Visit Estonia, and the Estonian Hotels and Restaurants Association included participants from Tallinn's catering businesses such as Lee, Tchaikovsky, Âme, Fotografiska, Barbarea, and the bakery Karjase sai. From the rest of Estonia participated Ku-Kuu, Lahepere Villa, Villa Wesset, Fii, Raimond, Soo, OKO, Wicca, and café Fellin.