We recently connected with Gabrielle Wainwright and have shared our conversation below.

Gabrielle, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear your thoughts about family businesses.

Owning your own business is the American dream right? People know a little about what it takes to run your own business. When I looked at my husband and said,” hey let’s start a business”, I didn’t know how much stress it would add to our lives but also more freedom for our family. You always see business owners taking luxurious vacations, driving nice cars, nice clothes etc, but you never see behind the scenes of what it takes to own your own business. I was a school teacher looking for a creative outlet during COVID times and I found my outlet in creating charcuterie boards for special events in people’s lives. Growing up, I was always in the kitchen with my grandparents and parents trying to learn how to cook and some of my best memories are when family is gathered around eating. I never thought I would own my own business, much less be able to have a business during the hardest times of inflation, and a pandemic. Things that work well for our business is my husband and I running it together. I’m the right brain and my husband is the left brain when it comes to the business. We also have a solid group of employees that have turned into family. My kids know them as aunts and that says something about our staff. With great staff, I am able to be a mom to my children when they need me the most. I don’t think I would be able to do it if I couldn’t be a mom first. Our kids are everything to us and when they need me, I have the ability to be there in a drop of a hat which is something running your own business allows. I think my children can be successful business owners one day in the future, I am not sure they want to run a charcuterie and wine business but I believe they have what it takes to run their own business one day. They will have a ton of spreadsheets from their father and notebooks from their mom on what is successful and what is not.

There are pitfalls with everything in life. It is how to make a plan to overcome them that matters the most. Food industry is really tough right now with the inflation and getting people to buy from you. We pivot a lot with our business when there is a speed bump that we run into.

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

I am an ex special education school teacher turned into a charcuterie business owner. I was looking for a creative outlet during some difficult times in my life trying to have a family and covid. Creating charcuterie boards allowed me to be apart of something bigger than what was happening in my life. We had some family in town one holiday season and I created this massive cheeseboard and one of my sister in laws said you should start a business. Ha, no thanks, I’m perfectly fine being a school teacher and then COVID hit and I could no longer see my students and teach them life skills like cooking, or gardening.

My story is simple yet fits my personality. Growing up, you could always find me in the garden with my grandpa or in the kitchen helping my grandmothers, my mom, and dad. I absolutely adore family time. It is the foundation of why I started this business. Food was always the start of the sweetest memories growing up. You ask me anything about my childhood and my stories will have staple family food involved.

My favorite thing to do is to host family or friends in true southern hospitality form; with food. I am the happiest whenever I am in the kitchen, listening to some music (preferably my Johnny Swim station), preparing food for anyone.
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Behind every business owner, there is an outpouring of love and support from family including my husband, John. I always said the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach with food. That’s how I snagged my hubs! John and I are healthy food lovers. Our main food groups are: meat, cheese, and veggies with occasional fruit! The “why” behind the business.

Why did I start a business? Well, when you are gathered with the people you love, there is always good food involved and you remember those special moments even more (just like my childhood memories). I want to be able to provide that staple, healthy, flavorful food for all of your events. Whether it’s lunch for work, to a birthday, to a date night to even a wedding, or remembering the lives of those we love. We want to be apart of those memories and show you the love through our food.

I think what sets us apart from others is having relationships with our customers, we know their preferences, greet everyone with a smile and remember small but important details about everyone who walks in the door. We treat everyone like they are family when they walk in and we give them our best every time we create food for them. Our quality control of our ingredients is something else that is important to me. We look at every single piece of food to make sure it meets our standards while also making it affordable.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

Our team morale has been one of the most important aspects in our business. Our staff started out with me and my family members before we opened a storefront. I would call my mom in to help or friend to help with a big order. When we got a storefront, we had one girl work with us and from that one person we have gained all of our other workers. When we interview, we have a process of answering a series of questions before they even get an in-person interview. One of my favorite questions is “IF you could be any type of animal, what would it be and why?” It’s funny but also you get to know a lot about people through the type of animal they choose to be. We also get every employee to take the enneagram personality test too and use that when creating schedules for high volume days. We treat everyone just like we want to be treated, with respect and understanding. There are standards to be met, but I will also pick up the phone when one of our employees needs help with anything in life. IF life throws curveballs at them, we help them through it as best as we can.

When our girls aren’t scheduled, I will still see them pop up at the store or text in the group message about something cheese related.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

CONSISTENCY is key. We have put everything on paper to create a “recipe” for success. Even though we have multiple employees and different employees on different days, there is a standard and recipe for everyone to follow. The consistency in every aspect of our business helps us the most. When you give someone a positive experience, they will share that with others and then more people come. Same if you give someone a bad experience, they will talk to others and then your business is avoided. When we make mistakes, we full up own up to them and try to make things right. Humans make mistakes and even when we give it our best and come up short, we make sure to communicate with our customers anytime.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.bayouboards.com
• Instagram: bayouboardsbygabrielle
• Facebook: Bayou Boards by Gabrielle

Image Credits
The photo of me and my husband (co-owner) is taken by: Captured by Court Photography