Eleven years ago, when Chai and Tang Lekcharoensuk opened their first Thai Restaurant in Cape Town, I was introduced to them by my client at Quay Four.

I remember the moment well. It was my first Tom Yum soup which seared my palate with scalding hot chili and started a love-affair with spicy cuisine, but I also remember not understanding one word of Chai’s massacred English. I went on to handle their publicity for many years.

Last night, we had a reunion dinner at Simply Asia in Heritage Square, and while listening to their extraordinary success over the last years with restaurants in Mauritius, New Zealand, Bangkok, Johannesburg and all over Cape Town, I wandered about long-term publicity relationships.

I think it largely depends on when in the growth cycle a publicist joins a business – if, like in my case in 1994 when both the client and I were green, individual growth trajectories may make it difficult to stay together. 

As I mature as a publicist and businessman I remember clients that acted as growth hormones – spurting me to another level of proficiency and billing. In my life that growth has been organic but I’m thinking now what it may mean to try to take control of the growth process.

Simply Asia have just today opened their newest eatery in Camp Street in the Gardens – thank goodness there is another place in Cape Town where you can have a night out for under R50.