Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Angelica Sammons. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Alright, Angelica thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Risk taking is something we’re really interested in and we’d love to hear the story of a risk you’ve taken.
My entire career has been one risk after another. The thing about being in the food service business is it’s risky on a great day for a well funded venture with investors and a cushion to fall back on. For people like me that scraped the bottom of the barrel to get started without a safety net are hanging by a thread. It’s a brutal world. That being said, I would do it again, and again, and again!!
From the start, I took our last $200 to buy groceries that I used to stock frozen meals for my family. A few of those meals ended up in the hands of friends who enjoyed them a lot and inspired me to start a frozen meal service called Freezerlicious. We made family style frozen meals at an affordable price. People like me with a large family really enjoyed the convenience of having dinner delivered for the week. We grew fast and had a die hard following of fans. One of the best adventures with Freezerlicious was doing an event called Menu of Menus. Was a team building exercise of feeding 2500 people in a couple of hours, it was small samples of our food. Masterpiece meatloaf meatballs, with mashed potatoes, and my now famous Coconut cream pie bites. INTENSE!! Such a great time!! I had 5 years invested in that “risk”.
A couple years into running Freezerlicious, I had a commercial kitchen I’d leased for the business. At the time we did pickup and delivery so the dining area meant for a restaurant wasn’t being used. I had the bright idea to start a lunch spot a few days a week while we were there meal prepping. The next risk resulted in The Hidden Gem Diner, we originally opened 11:00 am – 2:00 pm Tuesday-Friday. We had minimal hours, a bad location with terrible parking, and a small space to accommodate. I had no idea it would become what it did! We had such a great following of die hard fans, we were immediately operating at capacity. We had to extend days and hours. During The Hidden Gems original reign we had and electrical fire in the wall that took out the electricity in the prep room housing our 10 industrial sized commercial sub zero deep freezers. The floor under the 3 compartment sink caved in. Shut us down temporarily. Hurricane Harvey wiped out our groceries and stock of meals we didn’t give away during the storm. A tornado ran through the back parking lot, and floored a pecan tree inches from the building. That was a close call!! In the end we had a structural issue with the plumbing and a months long dispute with a lackluster landlord. We closed 5 years of Freezerlicious, and 2.5 years of the Diner. Had 4 days to vacate and abandon 5 years of blood sweat and tears. Risks and rewards. and one of the wildest rides I’ve ever had. I will admit I took that hard. It crushed my soul for a minute. Like 3 weeks to be honest I mourned the loss of both, because it was due to circumstances beyond my control. An upset for sure. I had the opportunity to relaunch the Gem a year later. We reopened as a smaller concept in the corner of a convenience store exactly one year to the day from when we’d closed the doors. Located on the corner of 830/ Cude Cemetary in Willis Tx. It is still going strong, we survived the pandemic, barely managed to skirt that one. Currently trying to navigate supply chain breaks, fluctuating prices of ingredients, and an erratic economy. Still willing to risk it….I opened another location.
Oh Le Crepes and Creations opened January 2021, it was 6 months behind the original deadline for building due to issues with Covid-19, supply chains, workers, etc. Tiles alone took an extra 3 weeks to get in the door. That may have been the biggest risk yet. A year of battling a pandemic, shut downs, quarantines, etc. wiped out our savings that had been set aside to launch the restaurant. I ended up leveraging credit, and borrowing money to get it started. A leap of faith in a very precarious position. I didn’t want to look back on my life and think “what if’ What if I hadn’t signed that first lease? I never would have gone through all of those upsets, failures, and best of all come backs!! Minus 1 year of being displaced The Hidden Gem Diner has been operating for 7 years now. In restaurant speak that’s pretty great. The new place Oh Le Crepes and Creations is in Conroe on League line rd. That was pretty lucky too. They are only 5 miles or so apart so stop in at the Gem get the best burger in town, then pop over to the Crepe shop for an inspired dessert.
Every single time I open a new concept or invest more into expansi0n I risk my families stability. I risk our livelihoods. It is not something I take lightly. They have total faith in me, I have total faith in my people, we have faith in our loyal customers.
I would absolutely do it again and again. While it looks pretty bleak when times are tough and you’re struggling daily to circumvent a pandemic type situation. Something beyond your control and all you can do is wait. Wait until you can make that run for the top again. Risk it all to go again, and again. Investing in yourself is the most worthy risk anyone can ever take! In whatever their passion is. I love my job, and my community. I love to cook, and share it with my neighbors. It’s a risk I am willing to take.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I started as a Bus Girl in a chinese buffet restaurant at 14 years old, worked for that family for almost a decade off and on as emergency personnel in all positions. So technically my first cooking job as a chef was a South Korean Chinese buffet. I spent many years working nights in a scratch bakery honing that craft. I made pastries, donuts, so many pies I couldn’t enjoy Thanksgiving for years after. I’ve pretty much spent the last 2 decades in the food industry covering every position available from the bottom up. It’s my art, and inspiration. I enjoy my job, creating new menu items, and testing ideas,
Both locations are in convenience stores, they have separate concepts. One is a Diner type menu, Breakfast includes a create your own platter, omelettes, scrambles, sandwiches, and tacos. Lunch menu baskets, burgers, and blue plate specials. The crepe shop has a new spin on crepes, we have a Monte Cristo crepe, a chicken fajita crepe, turkey bacon pesto crepe. Dessert crepes include the banana berry monster crepe, bananas foster crepe, and crepe parfait. Also on the menu, Breakfast full service like the Gem, Burgers, and Pizzas.
We succeed because we far surpass expectations for what is considered gas station food. They don’t generally set the bar high but we definitely have!
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
Covid-19 lockdowns, Owning a restaurant was pretty dismal for quite awhile. Luckily when they shut down everyone, my place was located in a convenience store. It was still operable as a commercial kitchen even if customers couldn’t come to us, we could come to them. I resurrected our frozen meal service for a time. Started making affordable family style meals again. We could prepare healthy well balanced meals and deliver them to families in the near by neighborhoods, with contactless deliveries. We didn’t exactly get ahead, but it was enough to keep our heads above water for a moment.
Can you open up about a time when you had a really close call with the business?
The original Hidden Gem Diner was located in a stand alone brick and mortar building. We were in that location for 3+ years when the pipes broke and the landlord refused to fix the issue. A restaurant can’t operate without a restroom. It tied my hands, the frozen meal service was still functional as it didn’t require customers in the building, but we had scaled it back so far to accommodate the Diner growth we were going under. I argued about repairs for two months before having to threaten a lawsuit to get out of our lease. I close 5 years of my life, in less than a week and walked away with a storage unit of commercial equipment. I failed, though no fault of my own, that was an extremely heart breaking time for me. Resurrecting the Diner in the corner of a convenience store was just fate. I brought it back and it’s running strong again. Just a hiccup, sometimes, you never know where life will take you.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.ohlecrepe.com
- Instagram: ohlecrepe
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/thehiddengemdiner www.facebook.com/ohlecrepe