We recently connected with Leah Carter and have shared our conversation below.

Leah, appreciate you joining us today. Do you manage your own social media?

I manage my own social media because I want all of my platforms to have the same voice. My voice. I also want to be able to share meaningful responses to tags, and questions. For example, if Susie loved playing with our play kitchen and her mom tags us in a picture, my comment on the tagged post would say “thanks for playing with us Susie, the kitchen will be right here when you return”. I am in my play cafe every day so I know my customers and want to continue the connection on social media. I think this type of connection would be ​difficult to establish via a hired marketing company.

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 background and context?

I started taking group exercise classes in college and fell in love with fitness. I lost weight but more importantly, I was mentally and physically healthy. I became a personal trainer to help people get healthy and get excited about exercise. After owning a personal training business for over 10 years, I started a family of my own and found myself overweight and unhealthy because I devoted all of my time and energy to my 3 little boys (Grayson-age 4, Jacob-age 3, Cayden-age 1). I started to lose myself and my friends. I wondered how I could incorporate my love for my boys, fitness, and friendship. 6 months ago, I came up with the idea for A Play Cafe. An indoor playground where parents can meet a friend to catch up over coffee while their little ones enjoy playing on our indoor playground. In addition to a coffee, pastry, and café style menu, we offer mommy and me fitness classes, paint and play, crafternoons, and much more in one space! I am now located in Duncanville, Texas where the summers are brutal so most parents keep their kids inside on their devices. But kids need to be active. A Play Cafe is the perfect place for food, fun, and fitness.

Our Cafe is a family place for everyone ages 0-99!

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

In the early phases of renovating our facility, I was scammed by a contractor for over $3,000. As a self-funded business, this was devastating. Honestly, I wanted to give up. Instead, my husband and I decided to watch countless hours of YouTube videos and learn how to do most of the cosmetic renovations ourselves and leave the remaining budget to hire licensed professionals for the mechanical renovations.

Any advice for managing a team?

I have a team of all part-time employees and several under the age of 18 years old. As a new business, there are days when I am swamped and days when no one comes in. I Involve my employees in marketing strategies, menu additions, and other decisions. I want them to feel like they are a part of growing our business. I allow my underage employees to have very flexible schedules. I also offer tip sharing that includes the cooks, hostesses, and baristas. Another employee benefit is half-off meals and drinks.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.aplaycafe.com
• Instagram: @aplaycafe
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/aplaycafe
• Youtube: A Play Cafe
• Yelp: A Play Cafe

Image Credits
Leah Carter