We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Bill Bracken a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Bill thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

I literally had no idea the impact my decision to create and start Bracken’s Kitchen would have on so many people. I’ve come to realize that there’s a lot of people walking through life wondering if there isn’t something more. Something more meaningful, something more heart felt or just something more that they should be doing. Or as Dr. Martin Luther King quoted so many years ago, Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, “What Are You Doing For Others?” After all, deep inside of every one of us is a longing and desire to know that in some way, it has made a difference that we have lived.

People often ask me about the decision I made to walk away from a successful career as a chef to feed the homeless and less fortunate. I certainly couldn’t have chosen a new path with a bigger contrast from my past life. I’ve gone from feeding the top 2% to the bottom 10%. But God has truly blessed me through this. While I know it’s common and cool for sports stars to point up to God when they do something great on the field of play but in my case my story is pretty simple, God truly did for me what I couldn’t do for myself.

I was always a slave to money. Not because I needed fancy things but because of the immense fear of not being able to provide for my family. I attribute this to the time in my childhood when my father’s company, ironically Seitz Foods, was on strike and he wasn’t working. My bedroom was closest to the kitchen and I remember lying in bed at night while mom and dad sat at the kitchen table trying to figure out how they would get by. They worked so very hard to ensure that we kids had all that we needed and never went without but those times were very tough. There were lots of nights when dinner was a slice of white bread and some soup poured over the top, ie: SOS, “Stuff On a Shingle” 😊

I believe it was that time in my life that created this immense pressure to be able to earn a decent living and provide for my family. Along with making my father proud of me truly drove me. I’m not sure how a country boy from a town of a little over 1000 people ended up in Beverly Hills but I did. Along the way I got caught up in the career rat race. After all I lived in Southern California and worked in either Beverly Hills or Newport Beach for more than 35 years. What you wear, what you drive, where you dine and who you hang out with was the world I worked in. A world driven by success which was defined by the size of your bank account. Don’t get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with success and wealth but when the drive and desire to achieve it blinds you to what is going on all around you, there’s a problem.

I got caught up in that to some degree and lost my way. My focus on my own success caused me to have a blind eye and lack of compassion for those with so much less. That drive to succeed and make dad proud fueled me and was my only priority.

When our economy took a huge hit in 2008 -2010, I watched a lot of really good people lose their job. While the place I was working was still making a profit and doing ok, friends were still let go and struggled to get by. And I mean really struggle. There were no jobs to be found. To see a grown man with a wife and 2 kids barely be able put a meal on the table affected me. I knew then that I was being called to serve and help but didn’t know how and quite frankly was too afraid.

At the hotel, I was tasked with unbelievable expectations and out of fear for my own financial survival put my head down and did what I was asked. I became detached and unfazed by the struggles of the people who worked for me. I was too worried about my own future to worry about theirs.

Then the unthinkable happened. At 48 years of age I was fired for the first time ever. I was walked off property and thrust into the lines of the unemployed. The fear, shock and dismay of being unemployed didn’t last long at all as I knew it was my calling. Losing my job in December was truly one of the bigger blessings in my life. I got to enjoy Christmas off with my family for the first time in my adult life. I was invited and actually able to attend a New Year’s Eve party. I had never been to one of them before then. I was always cooking. What a blessing.

While I struggled with many fears and emotions of being a 48 year old unemployed chef I knew it was part of a bigger story. The real fear was that my profession is a young man’s game and here I was old and out of work. In spite of the stress of it all it was truly an immense rebirth of sorts. No longer was I a slave to corporate America, I was free. I highly recommend it to anyone caught in the corporate whirlpool.

Soon after my departure I received many calls from people wanting to put me to work. Moving was out of the questions so I settled on a local project. While I truly wanted to focus on feeding the less fortunate I again got caught up in the money hustle with an investor who wanted to open a dozen restaurants. Needless to say, that project was a complete failure and there was no doubt then that I really needed to figure this feeding the less fortunate thing out.

I worked on a concept and built a business plan around a restaurant that would give back. I worked on several consulting projects to pay the bills. My wife was a trooper through it all and worked hard to help keep our family above water, financially. When I lost my job she was a stay at home mom and raising our 2 year old along with my 14 year old daughter and 18 year old son. God truly blessed me with her and her willingness to do whatever she had to do in order to help make this happen.

As I look back now, all of my early efforts and ideas had a common thread. I was desperately trying to hold onto that former life in luxury hospitality. Little did I know then, that deep inside it was my ego that was fueling this need. When we finally landed on the concept that would come to be known as Bracken’s Kitchen, I started the tedious work of getting our 501©3 status and building out the plan. We found out in the fall of 2013 that our application was approved and suddenly we were a bona fide nonprofit. I was knee deep in a couple of consulting projects so Bracken’s Kitchen got moved to the back burner until early 2014.

It was in the fall of 2014 when I came to the hard realization that if I was ever going to make this thing work then I needed to focus on it full time. I think that was one of the hardest leaps of faith. To walk away from all sources of income to focus on this and not take a salary was scary but needed.

It was as if God was saying, about time. It was only then that things started to fall into place. Betsy ended up on our doorsteps in December of 2014 as a gift and that one simple act forever changed our course. No longer was 2015 going to be a year to fundraise and buy a truck. Suddenly we had one and off we went. Our fist feeding event was even before we had Betsy but once we got her we really started feeding people and never looked back.

Fast forward to today and we have over 17,000 sq ft of space and a staff of 30. Our goal this year is to rescue 300 tons of food and provide over 2,000,000 for our friends and neighbors in need. That along with training students for careers in culinary arts makes for exciting times around here.

Bill, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Bracken’s Kitchen is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization based in Orange County California. Founded in 2013 our mission is simple: Through food rescue, culinary training and our community feeding program we are committed to rescuing, re-purposing and restoring both food and lives. The heart of who we are can be found in a statement first uttered in 1957 by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr; “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, what are you doing for others?”

At the core of our mission is a deep commitment to our nonprofit charity partners, business and professional supporters, volunteers, donors and employees. Our relationship with each and every one of these groups is as important to us as those we feed.

While food is our main thing and we work hard to keep the main thing the main thing we’ve come to a realization over the past few years.

Food is simply the conduit we’ve been given to reach people, to meet them where they are at, to love them. It is said that we rise by lifting others and we truly believe that. While we have many guiding principles and our “7 Culinary Attitudes” which is the foundation for our culture, we’ve ultimately adopted a statement uttered by Mother Teresa so many years ago. Let no one come to you without leaving better and happier. While very hard to do with some people, it is what we strive for every day.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

One of my favorite quotes is, “Culture exists, whether you create it or not.” I heard that many years ago and it really stuck with me.

When I started Bracken’s Kitchen, it was the first time I had complete control over the business and what kind of business and culture we would have. Working in the corporate hotel world for years, the culture was dictated or created by the senior/corporate leaders and owners. While I worked hard to create our own culture within the kitchen, it was always challenged by what was going on around us.

From the beginning I was intent and focused on what we would be as a business and what we would stand for. That proved to be a challenge in 2020 when we grew rapidly and hired a lot of unemployed restaurant workers. The culture in a kitchen can be demanding, hard, mean and down right toxic and when we brought many people in who came from that world.

We had to get real intentional about meeting people where they’re at, loving them and encouraging them to embrace a better way to work and live. All of our staff meetings were and still are lead around our 7 Culinary Attitudes. Our managers and leaders are expected to deal with the day to day on a daily basis so that we can focus on team during our meetings.

With a focus on team building exercises and life lessons we meet regular to pour into our team and help them learn better ways to navigate people and life.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Be authentic.

When I started Bracken’s Kitchen, I used my own money to start the nonprofit and had little capital for much more. Learning how to raise money by asking people to give was foreign for me and something I needed to figure out. Being a part of the Orange County community, I knew there were titans in the nonprofit sector who did it right and did it well. How would I get our message out there and how will I move people to support us was a real challenge.

The only median we had was social media, so we poured into it from day one. All we could do was share our story in an authentic way and work to just connect with people. Something we still focus on today. Being authentic means to show the good, the bad and the ugly. Letting people know we are real, and at times struggle but always focused on our mission.

It has served us well and we’ve had countless opportunities come our way as a result of someone reading or hearing about us on social media.

Over the years we played with various paid and targeted ads on social but we’ve found that connecting with our supporters in authentic ways, engaging them on social and asking them to help us share our story worked best.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.brackenskitchen.org
• Instagram: instagram.com/brackenskitchen
• Facebook: facebook.com/brackenskitchen
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bracken’s-kitchen-inc-/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@brackenskitchen5009