Simon Wright is a restaurateur, food writer and consultant with a special interest in local food and sustainability.

He is a former town planner having graduated from the then Bristol Polytechnic in 1985 with a BA (Hons) in Town and Country Planning.

Simon then worked for a short period for Three Rivers District Council in Hertfordshire before joining Cardiff City Council Planning and Development in 1987. He worked in both Forward Planning and Development Control divisions and was appointed to a Senior Planner role before leaving to join Llanelli Borough Council as Area Planning Officer in 1992. After one year he left local government to concentrate on his family run restaurant business at the Four Seasons, in Nantgaredig.

Simon and his wife Maryann founded Wright’s Food Emporium, Llanarthne a cafe/restaurant/food store business at the end of 2013 having sold their share in the award winning Y Polyn. Wright’s is focussed on the use of local and sustainably, sourced food and has won many awards including featuring in the UK’s Top 100 Restaurants awards and being named by The Observer as of one of the 40 best places to eat in the UK. Wright’s is situated in what was an empty and rapidly deteriorating coaching inn in rural Carmarthenshire. At the end of 2019 Wright’s had a turnover in excess of £1 million net of VAT, employed 15 full-time staff and attracted in the region of 1500 customers every week.

In 1997 Simon joined the AA as a restaurant inspector, taking over as Editor of the AA Restaurant Guide in 1999. He has written two books, Tough Cookies (Profile 2005) and The Wright Taste (Gomer/BBC) in 2009. 

Simon has worked as a television and radio broadcaster for the BBC and Channel 4. His programmes include:

• The Wright Taste - 2009 BBC2 Wales
• Make do and Mend 2012 C4
• The Kids Who Fell in Love with Food 2014 BBC Radio Wales
• Wales on the Menu BBC Radio Wales 2010 -2015
• The Secret Life of Welsh Food BBC Radio Wales 2016-1019

Simon also worked for 10 years on all the UK and Europe episodes of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares as Restaurant Consultant.

In 2010 Simon was awarded the Wales the True Taste Champion Award for his "dedication and devotion to Welsh food and drink”. The annual awards by the Welsh Assembly Government, recognise companies and individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the Welsh food and drink industry. The award recognised his achievements in editing the AA Restaurant Guide and presenting The Wright Taste on BBC Wales as well as educating young children on food and introducing cooking lessons into schools.

Simon has served on the Welsh Government Food Advisory Board and has been active for many years in contributing to food policy at all levels of Government including the Food Strategy for Wales and the Food Tourism Action Plan. Currently he is working with Coleg Sir Gar on designing further education courses based on sustainable and local food production and with Carmarthenshire County Council as a partner on it’s forthcoming project aimed at putting local food on the public plate.

Simon recently founded the Welsh Independent Restaurant Collective as a response to the challenges facing the sector from Covid-19. The collective now has in excess of 300 supporting businesses across Wales and is actively engaged with Welsh Government on strategies for the survival and recovery of the sector.