The upcoming Michelin Southern Restaurant Guide will be missing locations from one state this year: Virginia. Rather than paying the $360,000 “partnership fee,” the state’s tourism department took the unusual step of not only refusing to pay but also publicly revealing exactly what it costs to be included. Since the admission, it has been revealed that cities such as Atlanta, Orlando, Boulder and many others have paid as much as $1M for these fees.
Michelin argues that these fees are necessary to fund the cost of sending out reviewers to all these destinations to test and write about them. Critics describe these fees as a modern form of extortion from Michelin because they know how valuable a good writeup can be for a city or specific businesses in a region.
Perhaps most importantly, so far there doesn’t seem to be too much backlash on Virginia for taking this stand. As one business owner reported, “I’m kind of proud of the state for saying f*ck that.” So is this a form of extortion or a reasonable ask from a media company just trying to cover the cost of their work? What do you think?
