The men and women on Observer’s 2023 Dining and Nightlife Power List are believers. They believe in the restorative power of hospitality and the tangible and intangible rewards that come with it. They believe that restaurants and nightclubs make people feel more alive. They are the most important people in the industry, with the greatest influence on the future of hospitality.
Opening a restaurant or a nightclub in 2023 is an act of faith. The hospitality business is facing challenges, including rising costs, staffing issues, unforeseen delays and a world where everything from delivery apps to streaming entertainment make staying home more exciting. Plus, workloads are often high, while margins are often low.
The men and women on Observer’s 2023 Dining and Nightlife Power List are believers. They believe in the restorative power of hospitality and in both the tangible and intangible rewards that come with that. They believe that restaurants and nightclubs can make guests feel more alive. They believe that hospitality can be a platform that leads to multiple venues and multiple revenue streams.
For the people on this list, it’s not enough to have just one restaurant or nightclub. It’s about a financial and cultural impact in multiple neighborhoods or cities (including New York City, the Hamptons, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Miami, Dallas and Aspen), or it’s about diversifying into products, media, events, technology and other businesses. It’s also about creating an ecosystem that encourages and empowers employees to chase their own hospitality dreams. It’s about the feeling of crushing and drowning every day, about juggling multiple roles and finding ways to thrive or at least survive, so you can do it again the next day and the next and the next.
Dennis DeGori
There’s so much stimuli at this 24-hour Miami nightclub that certain VIP tables are sometimes sold multiple times on big nights, with top spenders happily overwhelmed even if they decide to leave before a headliner enters the DJ booth. After creating E11even, which debuted in 2014, DeGori has gone on to build a multifaceted business with a merchandise arm that sells $1 million in branded caps a year, a vodka line, a record label and other ventures.
This year, DeGori opened glamorous rooftop restaurant Giselle atop E11even, and there’s a forthcoming E11even high-rise hotel/condo development. During this year’s Formula 1 week (when E11even teamed up with Vegas nightclub Zouk on performances from Rick Ross, DJ Snake, Deadmau5, Travis Scott and Tiesto), many guests at prime E11even tables recognized one another because they had all come there directly from Carbone Beach.
