We recently connected with Tracy Kuch and have shared our conversation below.

Tracy, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Are you happier as a business owner? Do you sometimes think about what it would be like to just have a regular job?

As a new business owner coming directly from working for others, I find myself being happier on a regular basis. Daily, I am so thankful, even at this early stage in my business, for going out on a limb starting something that I never imagined doing.

At this point, having a regular job and working for someone else has no space in my thoughts. I am realizing how amazing it has been to not feel the stresses from someone else’s business and direction. My most current, previous job brought an abundance of pressure and stress in a lot of different ways. Every single day, I left unhappy and not wanting to continue on that path day to day. It truly left me feeling defeated, unworthy and frustrated. Owning a business is a constant stress, but it’s MY stress. My stress motivates me to push forward to grow my company. Stress brought on by others is demotivating.

Although, I am working more and have the stresses of growing a successful business, I couldn’t be more thankful that I took the plunge to make change, go out of my comfort zone and create my future.

Tracy, 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?

Food is love in my family, always has been. In my world food has been something that we share over good times, sad times, celebratory times and everything in between. I come from an Italian background and grew up in the Chicago area. My mom was the main cook in the family. She always wants to make sure that anyone that comes into her home is fed…food is love. So, having started a business that revolves around food is no surprise. I am following in her footsteps, except I am allowing our awesome, local Orlando chefs do the cooking.

It was almost as literal as I woke up one morning and decided to start a food tour company. I managed a local, gourmet food, retail store in town for 7 years when I made the decision. I couldn’t ignore the desire to work for myself and create my own successful company.

Wandering Palm Food Tours provides food tours in Orlando to locals and visitors alike. Besides enjoying food made by local chefs, supporting Orlando’s small businesses is a priority. Orlando is filled with so many amazing locally-owned restaurants that deserve to be highlighted. This is my opportunity to showcase them and introduce my guests to parts of Orlando that they wouldn’t know about otherwise.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I feel like there is a constant need to pivot in life, but for different reasons. Starting Wandering Palm Food Tours was a major pivot point in my life. Over the years, I have had had so many things I wanted to do or degrees I wanted to get, but many of them just fell through the cracks for one reason or another.

Waking up one day and deciding to start a food tour company was pretty random and unexpected, but it was the one thing that stuck and came to fruition. The idea spoke to my heart and my mind. I was in a rut and wanting to do more with my life, create my own future and do something that would allow me to work primarily for myself. This was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

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

The idea for Wandering Palm Food Tours came to me in August of 2019. I had no idea what it was going to take to start a business. I thought that I could get it launched by December of 2019. Boy, was I in for a surprise. December came and flew by. I had accomplished a lot of the administrative part, but the actual food part hadn’t been started.

In February 2020, I picked the first Orlando district in which I wanted to create a tour and started to make my way to multiple restaurants to conjure up some interest. That process was a bit defeating as restaurants were hesitant, but I didn’t know why. Was it me? Did they think that it would not be something worth doing?

Then it happened. March 2020. People becoming sick all over the world. Businesses closing every day. Travel came to a halt. The entire globe shut down. Covid-19 affected our world.

So many restaurants closed for an unknown amount of time. Now what?

I wasn’t ready to quit. When starting out, I came into this telling myself that I have no other choice than to be successful. So, with that resonating in the back of my head every day, I pushed forward. Food establishments were lost and not really knowing what their future looked. This pushed me even more. They needed help and a big part of my mission is to support local Orlando. I saw this as an opportunity for everyone. I continued to talk to restaurants in another district and found a wonderful group of receptive restaurants that were happy to partner. My first food tour was born!

Success is my only option.

Contact Info:

• Website: wanderingpalmadventures.com
• Instagram: @wanderingpalmfoodtours
• Facebook: @wanderingpalmfoodtours

Image Credits
Thuy-vi Gates, Tracy Kuch, Chris Gotshall