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

Tajia, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What was it like going from idea to execution? Can you share some of the backstory and some of the major steps or milestones?

Going from idea to execution is very simple- JUST START! when starting a business, you won’t have all the answers or even all the tools “necessary” to start but if you allow that to get in the way, you’ll be waiting to start forever. Many times the biggest thing stopping someone from starting a business and executing their idea, is fear. Fear that you don’t have everything “right,” fear that you might not make any money, fear that you might be told no, and that’s ok, fear is normal. Move with the fear anyway. Start the business with or without the help, with or without the “right” stuff. Execution doesn’t mean perfection, it just simply means you began!

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 back background and context?

I am a licensed clinical social worker and co-owner of food truck and brand, Hot Sauce and Pepper™️. Hot Sauce and Pepper has such a divine story behind it. Being a social worker, I practiced therapy for many years and during that time, I recognize that mental health was very connected to nutrition and diet. So I begin to speak out about how changing your diet can positively affect your mental health and decrease the need to take medications. I begin to speak about it everywhere including sitting on panels, social media etc. Eventually, I started an organization called Doctors Are Drug Dealers. With this organization, I created T-shirts to spark up conversation between individuals about alternative care for mental health and the potential harms of prescription drugs. Through this work, I was noticed on Facebook by an old friend from college. That friends, mother was diagnosed with cancer and at the time living in Arizona but didn’t have much support because the family is mainly from the East Coast. So the friend from college reached out to me on account of her seeing the work I was doing with doctors Are Drug Dealers, and asked me if I would be willing to spend time with her mother and so that her mother wouldn’t be alone. I have to mention that the friend from college, and I, hadn’t talked in years. This was just a divine intervention. So I accepted, and begin spending time with this beautiful woman. Eventually, she became too sick to cook her own meals and which led her to ask me if I would cook for her. Again, I accepted and every Sunday I brought her plant-based meals, in hopes that it would heal her, or at least help her to feel loved. She LOVED the food, and this is a woman from Louisiana, she knows good food! This was inception of the idea for Hot Sauce and Pepper™️! I started posting the meals on social media and before I knew it, people begin to ask me to meal prep for them, so I did. At the time I was pregnant with my youngest son, so eventually meal prepping became too much for me, and my husband had the idea to just sell one particular plate on a Sunday and “see how it goes!” Well it went very well! And from there, we knew we had something people not only liked but loved! People were buying us out! We then enrolled in a food accelerator learning program at ASU, and from there we built HOT SAUCE AND PEPPER into the successful food truck it is today!

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

Being community oriented helped the most. For me, being a social worker, my business was more than just a food business. My business is vehicle for us to build community while doing good business. From the very beginning, I understood that making real connections with customers and other community businesses was most important to the growth of our brand. Yes, you probably can build a business that’s just focused on making good money but we wanted to build a brand that leaves a legacy. Our brand now is one of the most well known in the vegan food industry in the Phoenix area because we focused on making connections, doing good and consistent work and through that we cultivated a trusting environment with our customers and business partnerships.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

Legacy Made Simple by Dr. Gena Jones, Esq,

The 4-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris

The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas J Stanley and William D. Danko

On Managing Yourself by Harvard Business Review Press

The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.hotsauceandpepper.com
• Instagram: Hotsaucenpepper
• Facebook: HSPFlava

Image Credits
Amelia Goe