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If you think you have the celebrity chef who rocks spiked platinum blonde hair, backwards sunglasses, and an eccentric wardrobe brimming with bold flame prints and retro bowling shirts all figured out, think again.
While Guy Fieri does embody all things righteous and funkalicious, he's been mulling over how he can leave behind more than just a lighthearted legacy.
For years, Fieri has embraced his status as the man who inspired many memes. After first receiving the Saturday Night Live treatment from Bobby Moynihan in 2009, Fieri became somewhat of a muse for parody artists and people online. He was impersonated in CollegeHumor videos, voice dubbed by a number of YouTubers, and his distinct style made him an extraordinarily popular Halloween costume. (Even Chrissy Teigen's dressed as him.)
To this day, the internet loves to poke fun at Guy. Recently he and his team, known as Knuckle Sandwich, decided to flip the switch and start cranking out high-quality Fieri memes of their own. Playing into the joke was a bold social media strategy, but one that worked to his advantage. The memes are such a hit with millennials and Gen Z that Guy has managed to find a whole new wave of fame online.
Before mastering social media, Fieri built an impressive career offline. Since winning The Next Food Network Star in 2006 (the show would later lose "the next" from its title), he's established restaurants across the country, authored several books, won an Emmy Award, was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and has hosted and starred in a variety of culinary and competitive food shows — some of which, including Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives and Guy’s Grocery Games, are still on the air today.
After nearly a decade and a half spent in the public eye, the 52-year-old chef doesn't want to become complacent. As he reflects on his priorities in quarantine, he knows what he wants to focus the majority of his energy on in the future: helping restaurant workers.
The food industry's first responder
"You know, when this all happened I was just standing by waiting to go cook," Fieri said during a phone interview with Mashable. He was calling in from his family ranch in Northern California where he and his 23-year-old son Hunter are temporarily quarantining as they cut brush and trim trees in preparation for a rough fire season ahead. Fieri and his family have been staying home for weeks, but he's still working.
When the coronavirus pandemic began escalating in the United States, Fieri thought, "Who am I going to go cook for? How are we going to make a difference?" He knew that social distancing, while crucial to people's safety, was taking a crushing toll on the restaurant industry, so he partnered with the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation (NRAEF) to create a fund dedicated to helping restaurant workers affected by COVID-19.
"There wasn't really anything happening in our area, so I kind of stood by. I waited a couple of days, and was starting to get a little stir crazy," Fieri explained. "I was talking with my team at Knuckle Sandwich, and I said, 'I've gotta do something.' We were having a conversation about restaurants being closed, so I said, 'How do we make money for the employees?' The more people we talked to and the more time we spent talking, the bigger it blew up. It was really just like a jam session with your buddies. We were sitting around trying to figure out what we could do to make things better."
The fund — which Fieri referred to as "a gigantic tip jar" — makes it possible for restaurant workers in need to apply for a one-time $500 check that can be put towards everything from utilities to personal housing, child-care, groceries, or medical bills. The goal is simply to lighten the financial burden on the millions of people struggling in the food industry. To kick off the fund, Fieri sent out videos to 45 people and asked for their help. "At the end of every video I made, I said, 'The restaurant industry has served all of us for so long and now it's our opportunity, it's our moment that we can serve the restaurant industry.'"
Since the fund publicly launched on March 27, it's raised a whopping $21.3 million, which means the team will currently be able to fund $500 grants for more than 40,000 people in need. The NRAEF team has awarded more than 10,000 grants to date, but recently announced that due to "an overwhelming response of more than 60,000 applicants," the application process has been put on hold.
While the NRAEF focuses on covering the restaurant workers who already applied for grants, they've stated on their website that they "remain committed to helping as many restaurant workers as possible, and are continuously fundraising to assist additional restaurant workers in the future." The team encourages those who still wish to apply for financial assistance to watch their social channels for updates about the fund.
Launching emergency funds focused on a hard-hit industry has become a trend recently. Similar fundraising efforts have focused on gig workers.
Guy's small business focus
Through shows like Triple D, Triple G, and Tournament of Champions, Fieri has used his platform to put small businesses and restaurant owners in the spotlight. But after watching chef José Andrés travel to Puerto Rico in 2017 and serve millions of meals to those whose lives had been devastated by Hurricane Maria, Fieri was inspired to step up his philanthropic efforts.
After the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas, which killed 58 people and left hundreds injured, Fieri called on Caesars Entertainment and fellow celebrity chefs — including Giada De Laurentiis, Bobby Flay, and Gordon Ramsay — to help him put on an elaborate "thank you" dinner for around 3,000 first responders. And when highly destructive fires burned through California in 2017, 2018, and 2019, Fieri worked to cook thousands of meals for first responders and evacuees.
In response to the coronavirus, Fieri didn't stop after launching the NRAEF fund. He raised awareness and bolstered spirits by appearing on John Krasinski's Some Good News show and Will Smith's quarantine show, "Will From Home," he filmed seven episodes of a quarantine special, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives: Takeout (and has four more on the way), and he's working to help local restaurants in his hometown of Windsor, California.
"The mayor of Windsor sends me this video of him going to a restaurant and getting takeout, and I said, 'Alright, I like it. You want some help with it?'" Fieri recalled. "So we came up with 'Meals with the Mayors.' The Mayor of Windsor and the Mayor of Flavortown. I'm up here at my ranch, and Dominic [Foppoli,] the mayor of Windsor, is back in his office. Restaurants send him a to-go meal, he eats it, and I sit here and talk to the owner about it."
"It's this mini Triple D-esque type visit, these little 5-minute vignettes of restaurants," Fieri said, noting the video also acts as a free advertisement. The two have recorded around 35 mini episodes and now Foppoli plans to take part in the initiative with mayors in other cities.
What keeps Guy rollin' out
When Fieri appears on your screen in any capacity, you know you're in for a good time. Like most famous people, he has his critics and his feuds, but Fieri's upbeat mentality, sense of humor, and unapologetic refusal to adopt a more subdued personality are large reasons why, after all these years, he remains beloved by people of a variety of age groups and political affiliations. His fans can rely on Guy to lift their spirits and provide comfort, but what does Guy turn to in troubling times?
"My family," he said, calling out his wife, parents, and two sons — Hunter, 23, and Ryder, 14 — who, if you didn’t already guess, pre-approve the brilliant memes that his team makes for his social accounts. Fieri, who fully admits he doesn't understand every meme that's presented to him, said he'll show his sons a concept and they'll go, "Oh my god, dad. That's the funniest thing in the world," or "Oh my god dad, this is the best one."
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Guy also finds comfort in cooking, listening to music, enjoying a good cigar, being outdoors, and spending time with his chihuahua, Smokey. But ultimately, he's restless.
"If I'm doing something, I'm much more at ease. I have to be creating, or contributing, or supporting, or generating. And I Iove to make people happy," he said. "Do I have bad days? I definitely do. I mean, I get depressed and bummed out like anybody does, but I have to exercise or do something to shake it. I can't sit there and dwell on shit."
"I've got a lot of people counting on me and I've got a lot of opportunities to do stuff," Fieri said. "I surely don’t want to spend any of that time not making something happen."
The future of Fieri's career
"I won't be bored," Fieri said with a chuckle after running through a lengthy list of things he plans to achieve in the future. When travel is safe again, he and his son hope to carry out their postponed tour of Asia — a follow-up trip to Guy & Hunter's European Vacation. He also wants to focus on expanding Chicken Guy!, his new restaurant franchise, and of course, producing shows.
Though he'll "always probably keep up with Triple D," and continue traveling the country testing out different restaurants, Fieri really wants to popularize his newest show, Tournament of Champions, which allows him to help propel careers forward. Tournament of Champions is an intense bracket-style competition show where 16 of the world's best chefs compete against each other for a championship belt and a major fan following.
"There's people on that show that aren't as widely known — that need to be recognized for not just how awesome they are as a person, or how awesome they are as a cook or a restaurant owner, but all of it combined," he said. "Doing those kinds of projects to me is so important because it gives me a chance to celebrate my brothers and sisters in the business that I don't think get as much attention as they deserve. You know, I've had my run. I've really enjoyed it."
The coronavirus pandemic has also changed Fieri's plans for the future by filling him with a desire to help restaurants recover.
"This next chapter, in the next year, all of the restaurants trying to rebound and recover from the pandemic are gonna need a lot of attention," Fieri said. "We're gonna do a real big campaign to remind people to go back out and eat, and to go to restaurants, and to visit your mom-and-pop joints. There are a lot of industries that are going to need some extra love and attention and the restaurant industry is one of them."
Before Fieri hung up the phone, he couldn’t help but search for a silver lining.
"One of the things we're learning through the pandemic... I think people are starting to [realize,] ‘You know what? We've gotta take care of each other more," he said. "That's one thing I've enjoyed. We've had so much negative shit going on for so long, and we hadn't even gotten to the presidential race yet. So to now see people helping and being involved? I mean, come on."
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Topics Celebrities
