We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Emmie Nostitz & Zach Knight a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Emmie & Zach, thanks for joining us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

Tivity exists to connect top-level Chefs with clients for one-of-a-kind in-home meals (or venue of your choosing). Our goal is to build a platform that will allow anyone to “Book a Chef” anywhere in the world.

When we started Tivity, we knew Chefs needed more ways to make money since restaurants were closing and things were uncertain. We also realized that Chefs were hungry for more creative outlets outside of the restaurant. This was during the pandemic when restaurants were closing or operating on modified schedules and limited capacities. Increasingly Chefs were left with minimal options and increased uncertainty, all while the demand for Chefs and their services was greater than ever. It is really from this missed-connection that Tivity was born.

We are a Chef-first business. We know that when the Chefs are happy and fulfilled, the guests will reap the benefits. Tivity is a tool and a new way in which Chefs can “open” their own restaurants without ever having to sign a lease. With this fundamental shift, Chefs are able to share their expertise and love of cooking with a new guest every night.

We believe having a meal with friends and family is one of the greatest experiences in life. We desire to create a new option to “go out to dinner” and get back to eating at home with friends and family. Currently there are three options when it comes to managing dinner or a meal: cook at home, go out to a restaurant, or order take-out. Tivity as a platform, creates a 4th option; Tivity brings the restaurant to you!

In short, our mission is to create opportunities for Chefs to make money and be creative. We provide tools for the Chef. We also create the connection with guests, so that at the end of the meal everyone walks away realizing that it was not only delicious, but unforgettable. We believe that with the correct tools and resources, Chefs can do what they do best! We want to create a world where every Chef has access to this service.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Tivity allows anyone to Book a Chef.

It’s something that sounds very simple, yet there is so much that goes into each and every dinner, lunch and/or breakfast we book. We act as the matchmaker between Chef and client. Finding out what each Client wants even if they don’t really even know themselves. Opening up the world of culinary possibilities to go beyond the simple choices that you find with most caterers. Our Chefs create food in every category from sushi to Indian to farm to table to West African and everything in between. We often ask clients to tell us about their favorite meal of all time, or what their favorite restaurant is and we build menus off of that.

We also work with each of our Chefs to ensure they are supported and have the tools to create each and every meal they take on. We are here to help create menus, discuss pricing, and support them as they enter a new home every night. Tivity is in the hospitality business, yes, but we are also in the business of inspiration. We want to inspire all of our Chefs to push their creativity, rethink what it means to be a Chef and where being a Chef can take place. This ultimately allows our Chefs to be their own bosses. We love it when our Chefs come to us with a new menu idea and we then take it to a client and sell it the following week. This allows our Chefs to have a versatility and freedom that they do not have in a restaurant. We like to say that each Chef opens a new restaurant every night in someone else’s home.

Both coming from culinary backgrounds (albeit very different), we approach Tivity with a fresh perspective filled with fun and together we create something good for everyone involved. We are building a company we hope other companies will aspire to be like. A company where everyone involved has a voice and helps in the growth of the company. We are only as good as those around us and we truly believe in Team. But we also believe in fun and living our lives. We work to inspire each other every day and push the limits of what we think Tivity is and can become. Austin is our home and headquarters and what we like to think of as our test kitchen where we can take on new challenges and try new things before we take them to other markets.

OUR BACKGROUNDS:
Zach, lives in Austin, Texas and has worked with various Chefs throughout his 12 years in the up and coming culinary-destination. Zach spent the majority of his time working with Hai Hospitality and worked in many different capacities at Uchi, Uchiko, and Loro from back waiter to General Manager and Training Director for the entire restaurant group. Before Austin, Zach spent time in Aspen, Colorado and San Diego, California working for Nobu Restaurants. With a strong background in fine dining and world class hospitality, Zach hopes to connect the hard working people of the restaurant industry with opportunities outside of the four walls of a restaurant in order to continue to foster talent, create livable wages, and new job opportunities.

In order to make this happen, Zach partnered with Co-Founder Emmie Nostitz who is an award winning creative in the advertising industry and marketing realm. Emmie is best known for winning the first Mobile Grand Pix in Cannes for Google’s Project Re: Brief and was honored in 2018 at the 3% Conference as a Top Female in the Industry.

Emmie has worked with a wide range of clients and companies including the advertising agencies Johannes Leonardo and Droga5 in New York. Some of her clients have included The New York Times, Google, Chase, Diet Coke, and Quilted Northern. Emmie loves the challenge of building brands people talk about. Coupled with a strong background in food and hospitality – growing up her father ran and owned a top catering company in Dallas TX, Emmie strives to create work that is iconic and apply herself in a way that has a positive impact on the world around her. Emmie hopes to amplify each Chef’s story and tell it in its own unique and authentic way.

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

We have known each other for nearly 15 years – and we are always friends before coworkers. There is not a single conversation we have that does not start with either of us asking how the other is doing.

I met Zach when he started dating my best friend from college. A few years later, I was a bridesmaid in their wedding, and I’m now godmother to their son. We were on totally different paths but always had a huge amount of respect for each other. During the pandemic, we were both searching for what to do next. On a ski trip, Zach’s wife reached out to me with an idea that Zach had. It was there, on a gondola, that we booked our first dinner without really even knowing what Tivity would become.

We put each other first and have made a point to ensure that we both have very full lives outside of our day jobs. Tivity has been the most rewarding thing either of us has done career-wise — and that is in huge part due to the fact we simply are having so much fun together doing it.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

We are only as good as our last dinner. Creating a one-of-a-kind dinner involves many parts and we ensure that our Chefs feel supported, our clients feel like the cost is worth the outcome, and that we are connecting the right people to ensure that each meal is special and exactly what the client wants. Our reputation is something we talk a lot about as we see most of our business grow via word of mouth. We believe each dinner should turn into two new bookings – if we do our job correctly everyone at the table will want a Tivity dinner or meal in the future.

We believe that technology will be a huge part of our growth and that is why we are building a comprehensive tool online to help with all bookings. However, technology can only go so far. We are a human-first company and our Chefs are at our core. We know as we continue to scale we will have to work to find ways to stay human and agile so that we can always solve the asks of any client or Chef. We can seamlessly create any type of meal and find you a Chef any night of the week.   

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.thetivity.com
• Instagram: @the_tivity
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/thetivity
• Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/company/thetivity

Image Credits
All images are by Megan Bucknall