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

Randi , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

I created FAB as a business workshop for all women in hospitality, no matter where they are in their career. It’s a place where they could learn about the true business of the industry, talk about the great things, and more importantly the hard thing about being a woman in hospitality. Its intent was and continues to be a place for people to connect with others, share stories, become each other’s resources, champions, and ultimately, empower one another. The two pillars of FAB are, zero bullshit and total transparency.

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

I am a New Yorker that moved to Charleston in the very late 80’s. I owned a business in the garment center, a wholesale children’s accessory showroom before moving. That work was not transferable to Charleston and took me a long time to find my way.

I always loved the hospitality industry, spent time both working in it and incorporated food, beverage and people into the events I facilitated. That forged the path in becoming the Director of Events for the Charleston Wine + Food Festival, a position I held for 7 years. We helped shape the national focus of Charleston’s food & beverage scene, and I feel are a link into this city being put on the map culinary wise.

The idea for FAB ( Females and Business) came shortly after I ended her time with Bad Bitches, an organization I founded with two other industry professionals. Through a series of events, we showcased women’s rise decade by decade from the home kitchen into the hospitality industry and awarding life changing scholarships to women in various positions in the hospitality industry enabling order them to move forward in their chosen career.

FAB was born because of my passion to educate women in the industry, along with teaching business responsibility. Women need to be given the right tools in order make smart decisions that will propel them forward in their career. Once that happens, they are in the driver’s seat and get to choose the direction they see for themselves. Education, it’s a beautiful thing! FAB also provides a strong network of like-minded people, can result in mentorship and create lifelong friendships.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Of course, everyone has a pivot story. I have pivoted so much in life that I’m a spinning top. I have always been a creative person and understands how makes something out of nothing, I love a bank canvas.

As far as I could see, there wasn’t a business workshop that spoke to women at various stages of their career, and I built that, and loved it, for three years until covid hit. We, like the rest of the world had to shift gears as our tickets had already gone on sale, content decided and speakers, 60 of them on board for the workshop. That came to a halt and I took the time to see how this industry was shifting and looking at the content that they needed to understand to figure out their lives and their businesses. We shifted to a 7-week, daily online workshop. We had to reframe all the panel content as what we had already decided on was obsolete, and so were many of those speakers that were the experts in that area. We had to find new speakers talking about how to make changes that were taking place at that exact moment in time, not an easy task.

We continued to build content even after the initial 7-weeks until I decided to shut it down. The online version of FAB was not effective any longer.

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

To build on shutting down the online version of FAB, it was more than stopping the programming, I fell out of love with the workshop I built and had to decide if I even had it in me to continue. I needed to do the diligence that I never had the time to do, like reevaluate my partnership with my website company, dig deeper into costs associated with FAB, and honestly, take a break! See if I could find the passion and love to commit myself to it once again.

I decided I would give it another go. FAB took place this past June and was home to 74 national speakers and 375 attendees. It was a sort of homecoming that everyone needed. There was a lot of healing that took place and a lot of sharing – it was cathartic in every sense.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.thisisfab.com
• Instagram: @thisisfabchs
• Facebook: @thisisFABCHS
• Linkedin: Randi Weinstein
• Twitter: ranwein

Image Credits
Reese Moore Photography