Eight weeks ago, I started working on a secret project that I’ve been so excited to share with you. And it might not be what you’d expect. A few people I didshare this with responded, “Wait, you’re doing what?!”
But let me back up:
One of the hardest things you do as an entrepreneur is convince yourself that no matter how many people are doing the same thing you do, the way that you do it is special, it’s unique, and your people will respond. People can steal your recipes, your event ideas, your website copy, style similar photos, but at the end of the day, they lack the most critical component: you.
You are your secret sauce.
At FOOD LA LA we don't spend time thinking about the “competition” because there isn’t any really. If anything, there are other people and businesses making our industry bigger, juicier, and more available.
Because we all have something unique and special to deliver, there’s room for us all. And when more people do the thing that lights them up, the world becomes a brighter, happier place.
Enter: Amanda Haas, former Williams-Sonoma culinary director and award-winning cookbook author. Years ago, a dear mentor who is unanimously everybody’s favorite person, and is as interesting (a marathon-running grandfather) as he is interested (teaching himself latte art), Pat Connolly—quick shoutout to Ryan who barely blinked before offering to introduce me to his coolest of cool dad!—recommended I reach out to Amanda.
I sent her a DM sharing that I was a big fan and excited by the work she was doing. She quickly replied, “Want to have a business chat!?” And from there, we welcomed her into the FOOD LA LA COOKING CLUB as a featured guest. She’s cooked Thanksgiving for the cast of Hamilton, seared scallops alongside Gordon Ramsay for a crowd of five thousand, and even cooks pajama-clad with Katie Couric, and in the blink of an eye, she was in our virtual kitchen cooking with our COOKING CLUB members (she dazzled with her famous fish en papillote recipe—it’s a killer every time!)
Six months later, she shared that she finally wanted to take her Instagram cooking classes online and give them a bit more structure, like we had at FOOD LA LA.
And the deal was done.
She was vulnerable and shared the inner workings of her business with me (coaching other people on their own businesses is my idea of relaxing 😂 ). We, especially women, don’t talk about money enough. Off the bat Amanda shared what she wanted to earn with this new business and it helped me build her vision.
Over the last six weeks, we spent hours combing over website copy, learning to juggle oranges for her brand photoshoot, dissolving into tears of laughter over word idioms, whittling her core message, designing her offer, working with her web developer, and tying up all the backend systems. I helped her build the exact same thing I had built.
And on Monday, House of Haas was born. And I’m so freakin’ proud of her. Similar to the FOOD LA LA COOKING CLUB, Amanda teaches live classes every month, and her first series of classes are themed around cookbook writing. Yes! You get to actually see how a cookbook comes to life. And she’s going to name her first 100 founding members in the book credits!
The world needs more of her spirit, her unwavering commitment to show up exactlyand only as her real self, her spunk, her unmatchable chops in the kitchen, her incredible generosity, and her dance moves. She’s as fun as she is razor-sharp, and she somehow combines years of technical knowledge with a bubbly, breezy, laughter-filled you-can-totally-do-this-too package.
And I’m so truly thrilled to share my new best friend with you (Amanda I like love love you—too soon!?). So hop on over and see what we built. Amanda’s offering a lot of special things to her Founding Members (through 5/1).
And don’t forget, there’s room for us all. A win for somebody else creating beautiful, delicious things in the world is a win for me and it’s making a brighter world for you!