We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Dana Boswell. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Dana below.

Dana, appreciate you joining us today. What do you think it takes to be successful?

I think what it takes to be successful is resilience, period. I have been a Personal Chef for 12 years, but not all 12 years was I a full time Personal Chef. The time between age 21-29 I kept a part-time job cooking for people while I was either personal training, working as a weight-loss consultant, front desk Dr.’s assistent or health food store check out girl. After all the small jobs I was filling in the gaps with, I knew I needed to focus on what drove me the most, which was cooking for people. When I focused on this 100% I became much more successful and could feel it in every bone of my body that this is what I needed to be doing. It has led me here to where I am full-time Personal Chef and happier than I could imagine myself being with any of those jobs!

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 am a Personal Chef and I cook healthy delicious meals for my clients in the comfort of their homes! I visit my clients once a week or bi-weekly preparing them a weeks worth of meals at a time to get them through their busy work weeks.

Backstory;
I graduated ECC (Elgin Community College) in 2011 with my Culinary Arts Degree. From there, I worked at a few restaurants in the area for only a few short years. By the age 21, I decided restaurants were not my cup of tea and started to figure out a way to cook for people in their home. I started out as a nanny cooking their meals and posted all my food and recipes to social media when it became more and more popular. The news about me cooking for people in their homes slowly took off where I was cooking for 2-3 families on and off. While I knew this is what I wanted to do, I worked other small jobs while I figured out a way to make being a Personal Chef successful. I.E, server, grocery store clerk at health food store, personal trainer, Dr. Office, and weight loss consultant. In the midst of these jobs, I did however pick up the hobby in the world of Body Building, I competed on and off for 4 years between the ages 22-26. Since competing was a very strict diet regimen of a sport, I always shared pretty pictures of meals I ate on my social media and that in itself interested people enough for me to cook for them the way I ate. Slowly, still cooking for people in their homes (one year in LA and back to Geneva, I may add) but I wanted to figure out a way to make a real name for myself. So, in 2016, I started my own Meal prep company called “Body Fuel by Dana Reneé”. The business took off for a solid year until I completely burnt out by the end of the year. I cooked for so many people in that year I lost track. I knew it wasn’t a maintainable job for myself so I backed out. I went back to trying to aim to being a full time Personal Chef but I was still filling in the gaps with small part time jobs. Between posting still on social media, word of mouth, and gaining.

Fast forward, in 2020 when Covid hit, I didn’t work for 5-7 months. Cooked and Personal Trained a hand full of times but it was rough. I really started to question what I was going to do and how to make this thing work. I did make an e-book online with all my recipes and marketed it to all my followers and sold many downloads of it! The more I shared about who I was and what I did during covid times, the more people were in need of my services they realized. People were tired of cooking themselves and wanted to be healthier. From that day forward, I have been able to maintain a full-time job as a Personal Chef and I am on year 4 as of today! Not only was I meal prepping in my clients’ kitchens, but also booking private dinners and small parties for my clients. My World changed after I finally got to this point.

I think what changed between then and now is that there wasn’t so much of a need of this service, or perhaps people didn’t know where or how to hire someone to cook for them in their homes. What has set me a part from other meal services is that I tailor meals 100% to my clients’ needs where meal prep companies are more so a “one size fits all” approach with limited menu options. Each week I visit my clients’ homes, I create new menus because I believe its imperative you get as much nutrition in your body as you possibly can.

I am most proud of my perseverance and my willingness to not quit this long journey I call my “job”. I truly believe when you absolutely love what you do, it doesn’t feel like work although you’re working day in and day out. I wouldn’t have it any other way. This job allows me to be as creative as I want to be and I can continue to grow within this business.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

What’s ultimately helped me build my reputation within my market is being myself. For those who do know me, I am a high energy person and expressive. I am this way with my friends, family and clients, which they say is contagious.

Aside from personality traits, I think it’s super important to be proactive in getting back to people quickly and following up with those who I have worked with in the past and present.

Moreover, I do share a lot on my social media about the meals I have cooked for clients between Facebook and Instagram and I have gained a lot of local followers just in that way. By staying consistent, which takes a lot of work, I think people like to see that I haven’t ever switched my gears in the last 12 years for those who have been following me since. And I know who those people are because I also pay attention to those who pay attention to me.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

In the 12 years that it has taken me to get to where I am today, it’s been a bumpy wild road. I think what kept me going most was that if I ever decided to do something else only because I didn’t “make” this job work, I would have been really hard on myself. Although I still was hard on myself, I never wanted to settle for anything else. Ive always kept this job as my main focus while working other jobs but only saw myself as a Personal Chef.

Contact Info:

• Website: bodyfuelbydana.com
• Instagram: @bodyfuelbydana
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chefdanarenee

Image Credits
Graham Blus (photographer) John Boswell (husband)