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

NICOLE, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. It’s easy to look at a business or industry as an outsider and assume it’s super profitable – but we’ve seen over and over again in our conversation with folks that most industries have factors that make profitability a challenge. What’s biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

You know, I’d like to think that we all start out with a passion when you’re involved in the service industry. Your “job” each and every day is to bring a certain feeling to those who chose your establishment to relax, indulge and come together to share memories in and our greatest hope is that you leave with such great memories that its worth returning and sharing with others.

As the shaken up world we’ve gone through over the past two years unfolds into where we’re going from here, it is easy to assume that financially we should be returning to a stable and manageable state.
For most restaurants thats is unfortunately not the case, so seeing survival is still something that is a concern on the forefront for each and everyday.
“Profits” is a scarce word these days and requires much adversity in order to see your way out of what has happened over the past two plus years, or for a start up business, your plan must be greater then the average bear,

Personally my businesses serve all hours of the day starting at 7 am and ending at 9pm so reflecting back to the point of what we do, the relationships we create through the service industry gains a great strain. Prices must go up as the cost of goods goes up. At times these prices can be so astronomical that it puts a customer in a position to start taking these price changes personally against the business, so you start to see losses due to the changes you have to make.

The sacrifice comes down to this, the profits you see at this point in the industry is between making the money and finding the fine line of keeping your clientele in an affordable and comfortable position while maintaining staff, quality and ultimately, integrity.
Grow yourself a team that is aware of the importance in following protocols, for us, thats “portioning”, consistency, having low waste and re purposing our products. Watching the market for the companies we’re directly involved with and adjusting our menus accordingly.

Do not sacrifice any time needed to put forth in making your business not only be able to exist, but gain money right now, find ways to be innovative, get your hands dirty and remember that just because you may be on top right now, one slip could be taken for granted and it could easily fall through your hands.
Be mindful of those we serve as we’ve all faced great losses and challenges, but in the end, we should see growth.

NICOLE, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

There are many ways in art to express yourself, to open up and put “You” into a song, a painting, a dance, a way of teaching, sculpting, or for me, its a “dish”-cooking.

My greatest accomplishment is being able to spread love, life and experience through food.
-I believe it is one of the few great things in life where we can still feel surprised for a moment, to share in something where we come together to enjoy the experience of indulging with love and laughter.

I found myself in the kitchen unexpectedly, starting in a sandwich shop at a young age, unsure of my direction in life. Over my time there I was very fortunate to work hand and hand with the owners, quickly gaining a respect and passion for diving deeper into the daily operation that made the company a whole.
I moved into the management and from there the challenge was on, I had never been in such an industry before and I knew this was just the beginning!

Coming from a place in life where I had to move out very young, 16 years old, so schooling and financial stability wasn’t something easily obtainable at that age. I knew I was really going to have to dig deep in learning everything there was in this new world around me.
I was instantly attracted to all the different food, the tastes, different cultures you experience through the origins of dishes.
Traveling became more about the food and the people behind the scenes preparing everything, spending time in LA where I gained a true authentic view into what Mexican food and culture was where my true passion started evolve. I was still young, in my early 20’s, living in North Hollywood, CA and working in the DTLA California plaza, making everything from scratch each morning.
-What more could you ask for as a young chef loooking to be influenced by the world.
I remember looking out the backdoor, smoking a butt w/ the guys, learning my kitchen spanish and staring at the L.A. Times sign thinking to myself, “man I am living the dream, how did I ever get here”
Fast Forward to today, I own and operate a Breakfast & Lunch Restaurant as well as a Mexican Cantina.

That is just part of the story and journey though, because on the otherside, anyone who has worked in this industry knows how gut-wrenchingly difficult it can be at times. Living this life take a great amount of strength which doesnt just come from one individual, it comes from a team of people who can see a vision with you and are willing to walk that path together.

What I seek now is creating an environment where we can continue to grow as chefs and individuals, one where the cooking world doesnt seem so harsh and taxing.
Sounds crazy, I know, and its hasnt been easy, but we believe that we should be able to cook and live our lives too!
As the world moves into a life where we want to be rewarded for our hard work and be able to take time off, its important to mindful of our health.
Our Focus is creating fresh food from scratch, remembering what we’re here for; Family, Fun and Food.

Let’s move on to buying businesses – can you talk to us about your experience with business acquisitions?

I often like to reflect back on the beginning of my journey into ownership of my first business. Making any big decision in life will always have its pros and cons and this story may have faced one of the biggest cons that we’ll see in our current time, the Covid-19 pandemic.

I think that we can all share in a story or situation where the epidemic had affected us negatively, but for us, it seemed to launch us into one of the toughest projects we’ve faced so far,
It was March 2020 and I was just about to sign for my first restaurant, this was it, this was the dream and we had reached. It was a sunday afternoon and my wife calls me to tell me that Boston had just announced, “No more indoor dinning” and I dont think we should sign tomorrow.” It was a hard pill to swallow, we sat back and waited as we watched the world change.
That lasted us about 4 months and on July 29, 2020, I signed for my first ever restaurant, little did we know, we’d have to learn more about ourselves, our loved ones and our community more then ever. It wasn’t just operating a restaurant, its about learning to navigate through life all over again while trying to provide some sense of normalcy.

As staffing was scarce, you see yourself in a restaurant that seats 82 people inside and another 20 outside, only able to start out seating the outside 20.
What kind of menu do you put out, how do you honor the loyal patrons who want to see you each and everyday but you can barely open the doors because there’s only one cook and one server?
You order enough food to sell, but can you stay open to sell it?
Does everyone feel safe, comfortable, not burnt out, heard.. the list goes on, but here we had just set out to cook and spread the joy of it.

We knew it would be tough, we knew we loved what we do and if we buy this restaurant, we can lock in how we connect with our community, we can keep doing what we love and providing a place for people to share in that with us.

The key components to making it through such a time was always staying ahead of what could happen, I don’t want to say plan for the worst as if we expected anything negative to happen, but if you didn’t, you could be blindsided. Prices of food and goods continue to fluctuate at a high rate and as though some items may have decreased, Items as such a simple fry oil is still seeing numbers that had tripled throughout this experience.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Todays life is full of “snaps”, selfies, story lines and the obvious love for social media, it is a key today to expanding your business.

If you’re an old schooler, you best find your way into tiktok or any of the other many platforms that we have at our fingertips. Posting your brand on any of the above, making videos and being present is whats going to get you and your talents out there. these days.

There’s another aspect of this sharing that we believe is missing a great piece.
We follow chefs we love, actors, artists, performers, influencers; we’re in awe of them, their talents and the spot light that comes with it.
Well here in our industry and the world we reach, we like to showcase who we love, who we think is talented and deserves the spotlight. After all, we wouldn’t have made is here if there weren’t others in the service industry trying to make it just as bad a*s as we are!

The tactic is, as business owners (Breakfast & Lunch restaurant, Mexican Restaurant and Salon) that as we visit relatable companies, we build our company up, by building up the ones around us. Its that simple.
If a house in a neighborhood is less presentable and of lesser value, it will take down the cost of those around it.
We’re all here to be successful and it doesn’t start or end with just one amazing company.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.purplefinchcafe.com
• Instagram: freshbites13
• Facebook: Nicole Courtois
• Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/nicole-courtois

Image Credits
Ethos & Able Creative – Dante Marino & Vinny Marino