We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Marie-Catherine Dubé a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Marie-Catherine, thanks for joining us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

Though I still have a full-time 9-5, I’ve reached an income point with my creative work that surpasses my corporate job. I can definitely say it’s been a journey!
I started out pursuing food photography as a creative outlet during COVID, going back to playing with food like I’ve always enjoyed doing. I had time to work on my photography skillset, which was really starting from zero, and having no pressure from the income perspective allowed me to truly be creative and fully explore every aspect. After a few months I posted a photo that included products from a local company I love, and from that post we began a relationship that lead to my first paid work! I never pursued more partnerships, but I was extremely consistent in my practice. I strove to get better, always be learning, and the itch to discover all the things I didn’t know led me to more clients. At the end of 2024 I decided it was time to take my business to the next level; a close friend who has a business I admire helped me create a 1-year business plan and I hit the ground running in 2025. Laying out steps of what I wanted to accomplish has been a game-changer and I really believe has led to the income level I’m earning now!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I run a food photography business–this includes working with restaurants, bloggers, chefs, and food brands to create marketing imagery for their own business needs.
It’s a funny full circle for me, really. I went to school wanting to become a Food Stylist, enrolled in a Food Science degree program. About a year in I decided it was far too science heavy for my left-sided creative brain and I changed my career path to Industrial Design. After graduating, I worked for about 10 years as a professional designer; COVID hit and so did layoffs! With my spare time I began playing with food again and snapping photos on my phone. A huge part of what we do as food photographers is food styling…so, more than 10 years later, I’m now working in what I wanted to do so many years back! It didn’t take long at the beginning of my journey to discover that food photography is a professional field, and it took even less time to fall in love with it.
My clients are looking for images that are scroll-stopping, droll-worthy representations of their beautiful food and yummy recipes. Bad images can make it or break it in the culinary world! I’m so proud of the client base I’ve built and how much I continuously learn. There are so many challenges every day but it’s incredibly exciting to be earning an income from my creativity and things I produce with my hands (and camera!).

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ll keep this one simple; scarcity mindset. In a creative field and business, mindset is EVERYTHING. I know that sounds so corny and cliche, but man is it true. I had a week early this year when a client was being extremely difficult and I had two prospects that were also very difficult to negotiate with. The first reaction when you’re a young business is to take everything that walks in the door, because what if nothing else comes along?! Ah, what a learning point. Over the next few weeks after that very trying on in January, I scored a new contract a week for four weeks in a row. Lesson? Leave the doors open for things to exit when it’s time, and new things will come. There is always more out there.

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

I’ve been heavily focusing on client experience for the past five months; I like to think that my work speaks for itself, but I’ve gotten numerous clients as referrals from current clients and I really believe that being great to work with makes people not just come back, but tell others about you.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @pickedandpeppered
• Other: My new website will be launching June 2025, so I won’t share my current one here yet! You can find me by searching “Maison Dubé” food photography on google or instagram.

Image Credits

Headshots by Kelly Shotwell, Branding/logo by Maya Palmer, other photos by Marie-Catherine Dubé