Alice Cheng Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, everyone. You are listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond, coming to you from Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center in the heart of New York City.
Today's guest is Alice Cheng, the founder and CEO of Culinary Agents, the hospitality hiring platform. Alice joins me to talk about the hottest restaurant jobs, what cities are bustling, and why restaurant employers prize communication skills over food skills when it comes to hiring. Surprising, right? And of course, we talk about Alice's career path, from Fashion Institute of Technology student to IBM temp to respected entrepreneur and founder. Stay tuned for my chat with Alice Cheng.
Some housekeeping. Our Jubilee conference is less than a month away. It's our big annual event and it's taking place on Saturday, April 12th at the Glasshouse in New York City. It's a beautiful day of community, connection, food, and drink. This is our 14th Jubilee, which I cannot believe. We've done 12 in-person Jubilees and we did two virtual ones, and the very first one took place back in 2014. Since then, we've celebrated and networked with thousands of women and culinary creatives from around the U.S. and around the world. For more information and tickets, visit cherrybombe.com. If you are an official Bombesquad member, be sure to check your inbox for special member pricing on Jubilee tickets.
If you are in New York City on Thursday, March 27th, join us at Alex Mill at Rockefeller Center from 6 to 8 p.m. for a fun night with the Alex Mill team and team Cherry Bombe. Come by and shop the spring collection, enter for a chance to win Jubilee tickets and an Alex Mill gift card, and enjoy treats from some of our favorite local bakers. I'll be rocking my favorite Alex Mill jeans and we are ready to do any personal shopping or styling you need. Everybody is welcome. Just come on by. For all the details on our Alex Mill event, visit cherrybombe.com.
Now let's check in with today's guest. Alice Cheng, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Alice Cheng:
Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here.
Kerry Diamond:
We're going to talk about your life and career, but first I would like to get some advice for folks interested in restaurant or hospitality careers. Culinary Agents helps folks find work in restaurants, hotels, events, catering, and specialty stores. So if you are looking for a job in a food lab at Unilever or a cookbook editor job at Clarkson Potter, Culinary Agents is not the place to go for that.
Alice Cheng:
Well, it depends. It depends.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, tell me more.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. You know, what we've found over the years, this is going to be our 13th year anniversary, is that really businesses who are looking for anyone that has hospitality or culinary or beverage types of skills look to us as a place to put their openings. We've got almost 2.3 million users now across the U.S., and so businesses that are looking to vamp up their customer service, and we are seeing a lot of lifestyle brands that are looking to get more into food and beverage.
So there really are more unique positions getting posted-
Kerry Diamond:
Interesting.
Alice Cheng:
But the majority are restaurant and food and beverage and hospitality related.
Kerry Diamond:
Good to know. How many people are employed in the hospitality industry in the U.S. today?
Alice Cheng:
We're still waiting for the 2024 numbers. I think the last that I saw was roughly 16.8 million or so, and that was 2023. It's about the pre-COVID levels.
Kerry Diamond:
It is.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. Yeah. Now 2024, we saw things kind of start leveling out and normalizing, and 2023 definitely had the spike. So it's kind of interesting. We'll wait to see what's coming out, but early predictions that I've seen and heard has said that 2025 is going to surpass pre-COVID levels.
Kerry Diamond:
To what do you attribute that?
Alice Cheng:
I kind of say 2024 is a normalization where restaurants kind of started focusing more on growth versus just recovery. A lot of the projects that were delayed, a lot of new projects, different ways that businesses are collaborating and looking at projects, cities that have more opportunity now for various reasons, and talent that have relocated there. So you're seeing different metro areas kind of grow at a faster pace, and you're seeing kind of, as I mentioned, more of these collaborations of lifestyles, whether it's hotels that are intentionally seeking collaborations with restaurateurs and that causes a growth and expansion into different cities.
So lots of different things. Very exciting. And then non-traditional businesses that are looking for more hospitality-related services to incorporate into their offerings.
Kerry Diamond:
You mentioned some cities are doing better than others right now. What are the hottest cities right now in terms of restaurants and hiring?
Alice Cheng:
I always put the caveat that it's Culinary Agents data, and we are larger and stronger in certain metro areas than others. But top 10 for us are in New York, New York, of course, New York City, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, Boston, and Atlanta are top 10.
Kerry Diamond:
So if you were just starting out today or restarting your career, where would you move?
Alice Cheng:
That is a tough ... Me personally?
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Alice Cheng:
Well, my advice to others would be if you are considering moving to another area or you're open to relocation, I think it's worth taking a step back and thinking about where you want your career to take you. Who do you want to work with, what businesses excite you, what do you want to learn? And I think a lot of that has also to be coupled with where are you in your life? What are your priorities?
I think one of the things that became very apparent post-COVID was that people's priorities shifted. And if you remained in this industry and you realized that this is your career path, you realized that there were a lot of different ways, directions you could go, but also what do you need?
If finding a job for financial reasons is your top, top, top priority, okay, great. This industry is great for that. Look for those types of employers and opportunities. If you're looking for a longer-term career and you want to learn from certain individuals or you want to gain some experiences, seek out how you can get those. And if you're willing to relocate, you will find that opportunities in a variety of different metro areas are both lucrative and can be very rewarding.
Kerry Diamond:
We're going to talk more about that, because you mentioned lucrative. That wasn't always a word associated with kitchen jobs.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
And career pathing is something that's very important to Culinary Agents. I noticed that from digging around your website. You have this really great feature that you've got folks like Avery Ruzicka, you are even on there, and it shows people's career paths. And it's so interesting to see that.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, and ... Wow, I could talk about this for the entire show.
You know, from the very beginning when we started, it became really obvious that when you showed people how they got to where they were and advice, that would not only inspire people, it would motivate them, and it would give them sometimes new hope that they can think about things differently or they could have a longer-term career and/or the skills that they were learning now, and the time and effort they're putting in now could absolutely benefit them in a variety of different ways later on.
We've always known that this industry just offers so many different types of opportunities. It's also a place where people can stop by, do it on the side, or make it their long-term. With Hospitality Career Paths, we always had a section within Culinary Agents that showed people's career timelines and advice, and we kind of called it virtual mentorship and shared it freely and people really loved that content.
And late last year we decided that that platform needed to shine on its own, so we actually created hospitalitycareerpaths.com and coupled it with data from Culinary Agents around pay and benefits. Think of it as a career platform to help people just search, find data, understand earning potential, required skills, and really just have the tools that they need to map out their career paths, or at least see what their potential is so they can make decisions for themselves.
Kerry Diamond:
You mentioned opportunities. What are the most in-demand jobs?
Alice Cheng:
Well, right now, based upon Culinary Agents data, we're ramping up for spring hiring. Positions for back of house, for example, have always been pretty consistently in. Line cook, sous chef, dishwasher are the top three, closely followed by prep cook and executive chef.
Given the name Culinary Agents, we definitely started focused on back of house, but front of house really is half of our audience in our talent pool, and so for front of house, server, host and general manager tend to continuously be the top three. But restaurant-specific roles perform very well on the site.
Kerry Diamond:
Has that changed over the years or have those been the consistent top jobs?
Alice Cheng:
They've been consistent. I would say different permutations of it. So if you want to call it a chef de partie or you want to call it a prep cook or... You know, there are different words and that's why we're unique in the way we map things and we match things, and those nuances get folded into our algorithms because we're dedicated to this industry.
Kerry Diamond:
You mentioned back of house and front of house. Culinary Agents did a survey last year on the most requested skills for back of house and front of house jobs. What did you find?
Alice Cheng:
Well, first, it wasn't really a survey. We actually gathered our own data and surveyed ourselves, if you will, and aggregated it. Because we A, thought it would be revealing, and B, I think we've been talking for a long time, but we're seeing, not just this industry, focus on more skills-based hiring and helping people understand, what are the skills that you need to obtain in order to progress in your career or to get that job that you want; and again, in the spirit of sharing information and making sure people have what they need to get to the next step.
Back of house, the top skill that people requested from a business standpoint was communication, actually. Communication. Second was cleaning and organizational skills, closely followed by things like teamwork. And basic standing for long periods of time, believe it or not, is a skill that people put in job descriptions. And then food prep, customer service, time management.
Kerry Diamond:
Communication was number one.
Alice Cheng:
Number one. Number one for back of house.
Kerry Diamond:
Why do you think that is? I mean, anyone who's watched “The Bear” knows, or who's worked back of house.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, and I think communication comes in many different forms. It's probably because of a variety of things. You need to work in high-pressure environments, in dangerous environments. In order to have good teaming and kind of get all on the same page, you need to be able to communicate.
Kerry Diamond:
How important is college or culinary school when it comes to a career in the restaurant industry?
Alice Cheng:
I feel like this question has been a long-debated question from-
Kerry Diamond:
It absolutely has.
Alice Cheng:
... 10, 15, 20 years ago.
Kerry Diamond:
It's come up on the podcast quite often.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. And I think that the answer remains to be relatively the same. It depends on the position.
If you say back of house and you talk to chefs; I'm not a chef by trade. I love to cook though; a lot of them will say, "Get some experience." And culinary school definitely will give you foundation and it's great and you can also build a network as well.
However, some people I've heard say, "Before you make that commitment, go work in a kitchen or get some experience and see if that's something you really want to do and something you really enjoy and love." I've heard that once that happens, sometimes you just keep cooking. You know, a lot of kitchens will value experience, working experience, as well as culinary school, and vice versa.
So I think with that, it depends. I think the focus is more on, is this something you really want to do before you spend time and money and energy to dedicate to it?
And then the next question is your personal situation. If culinary school is not in the cards for you and you know it's something that you love and you want to do, find a kitchen, work for someone, work for a team, get in there. And it goes back to also being intentional with finding an employer or people that you want to learn from and just going for it.
Front of house, I think it has different approaches. You definitely have seen successful folks come out from Cornell and in a lot of schools that have hospitality programs. More schools have also started including hospitality programs in the curriculum.
I can't personally say whether or not school is the ultimate deciding factor as to if you're successful or not. I think it definitely comes down to the individual, their work ethic, their ability to communicate and build that career for themselves. And that I think can be applied to many other industries as well.
Kerry Diamond:
Are the higher-end restaurants looking for culinary school?
Alice Cheng:
You know, I think it depends. I think definitely culinary school can be a feeder. You know, relationships and career affairs, et cetera. Coming out of there, there's an expectation that a certain level of learning has been applied, and sometimes that is a predetermination of that person's going to be able to catch on and be able to be successful in that kitchen early on.
So it's really at the benefit of both sides. You don't want the individual to not be prepared coming in. That could potentially hinder the development and the progress of other people in the kitchen. So because everyone's working so closely, it could have a ripple effect.
I think more enhanced kitchens factor that in. It's like, what is the impact on the broader team? And if an individual seemingly has already a good baseline of skills and understanding, the assumption is that they'll come in and be able to pick up things a little quicker.
Kerry Diamond:
If you want to make money in this industry, where should you work and what should you do?
Alice Cheng:
This is a loaded question.
Kerry Diamond:
I know. As it came out of my mouth, I was like, "Yeah, it's not that simple a question." But people want to know that.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
You know, that has kept some people out of careers in hospitality and restaurants, thinking they'll never make money.
Alice Cheng:
Absolutely. And ... Well, I don't think I know. I know that's why we wanted to intentionally break out Hospitality Career Paths and put this data in the hands of talent.
And businesses, right? Because businesses are constantly asking as well because they, believe it or not, also want to be competitive and they want to do what's best for candidates as well.
So I'm going to say it depends initially. It depends on what you want to do; if you're looking at, for example, front of house.
It also depends on where you are in your life. Again, one of the I think complex, wonderful things about this industry is that really there's something for everyone. If your situation is you're here for now because it's a flexible workplace and you can make money and all you want to focus on is making money, then typically, depending on where you are, you find the busy restaurant that has the regulars and get a serving position or a tipped position that you have the potential for upside; or you work in an organization that has potential bonus structure or ways that you can make more, dare I say quickly, but have the upside that some other positions may not.
If you know that this is a long-term for you or you've been at it for a while and you've determined to build your career, you want to open a restaurant, you want to work for a larger corporation and be a leader, et cetera, then you need to work back and figure out how you get there. There's a little bit of this understanding that one has to have with themselves that you put in the work now and you can reap the benefits later.
Kerry Diamond:
Didn't Thomas Keller start out as a dishwasher?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. And many people started out as ... You know, I just interviewed Gavin Kaysen and caught up with him last weekend, and he started out at Subway making sandwiches. I started at IBM in the mailroom. There is something to be said about putting in the time when you are ... I don't want to say younger. When you're starting out, no matter what age you're in. Because that time is going to benefit you down the road.
Oftentimes when you look at leaders and they're able to do simple things, whether it's spend some extra time with their family, go see their son or daughter's soccer game, it's easy to say, "Well, they're the owner, they're the so-and-so, so of course they can go." But it took them a lot to get there, and they paid their dues most of the time, if not all of the time.
And so my kind of long-winded indirect way for answering that question is, if your goal is to make money now in this industry, the jobs to look for are the ones that have upside and that you have the ability to make more than just whatever the hourly wage is. And finding a busy restaurant and crushing it as an individual working really hard and really working that job is a path to that.
If you're looking for longer-term success and you're like, "How do I make money in this career?" There are many ways to do that, and you're seeing ... You know, we gave a lot of examples of leaders that once you get to a certain point, more opportunities open up. And I think consistently what we hear is, along the way, the journey, you work hard, you're a nice person, you build your network, you give back, and those things come back to you tenfold.
Kerry Diamond:
You mentioned bonuses. In the past, it was really rare for restaurants to offer health insurance or benefit packages or bonuses of any kind, but I understand that's changing for the better. Do you have to work for a big restaurant group to get benefits or are smaller independent restaurants offering them too today?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. One of the trends we saw when we started looking at data from 2019 to 2023 was that more independent restaurants and smaller restaurant groups were offering benefits.
Now it may not be the full benefits package. What we saw was just this intention to offer more. And if it was certain benefits, maybe it was after a certain number of days; because benefits are very expensive to offer, especially for a small business. If they couldn't offer things, they were offering other perks, whether it be flexible, additional pay time off, sick days here and there, kind of offering what they could. That was something that we hadn't seen a very conscious effort in the past. Or maybe it was happening and it wasn't getting reported to us.
And we intentionally put benefits sections into Culinary Agents for jobs because that's a way an employer can set themselves apart. If you're not a huge employer and you can't offer these things, what can you offer, how can you set yourself apart? Because not everyone's looking to work for those big employers and not everyone has a top priority to have benefits, right? So it's more of, what can you offer and what are you doing? And a lot of people recognize the effort and they'll make decisions for themselves based upon what they need and what their priority is.
Kerry Diamond:
You launched Culinary Agents in October, 2012. What is the biggest change you've seen in the 12, almost 13 years you've been in business?
Alice Cheng:
Wow. So many changes.
I'd like to say that the biggest changes, we are seeing many more intentional career folks in the industry, the level of professionalism across many different positions, even across the conversations that individuals have, talking about how their parents love to go out to restaurants and they're so proud that so-and-so works at this place. I feel like those simple conversations really are indicators of just I think the overall food scene shaping more of lifestyle and culture and understanding. And the more of that that we have and the more data that's available, the more people can make decisions for themselves as to whether this is for them or not, and be able to explain it to those who they may or may not need to explain it to. So just the professional evolution of the industry.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, that's great to hear. What are some of the pivots that the company has had to make in response to current events, economic conditions, the pandemic, et cetera?
Alice Cheng:
Well-
Kerry Diamond:
It never ends, does it?
Alice Cheng:
Exactly, exactly.
Well, I am so proud to say we've actually never pivoted as a company. We've never changed our mission. We've always been here to support the hospitality industry, to help people in their careers. And it started out as more of a job board that evolved into a full-blown applicant tracking and job marketing platform for businesses and a tool for talent for finding jobs and communicating with employers and discovering careers. As far as that from beginning to now, we are still full force focused.
Along the way, of course we've had to continue to kind of evolve based upon the needs of the industry. The most obvious one would be the pandemic where we immediately shifted to just focusing on resources to help people. We were getting questions from every direction. And as you know at that time, the information was dribbling down in different directions and everyone was kind of in wait mode. But we knew that the industry would need us in many different ways on the other side of it. So we were also simultaneously thinking about, what are the things that could help the industry get back as quickly as possible? Because we knew that everyone would be reopening basically at the same time.
Kerry Diamond:
You did know.
Alice Cheng:
Well, we just-
Kerry Diamond:
I don't know. I was in full-on ... It was so tough here in New York. I was in full-on panic mode for a long time.
Alice Cheng:
Yes. I am a strong believer in willing it to happen. I was like, "We will open. Everyone will open." I couldn't tell you when that would be, but they weren't going to keep everyone closed forever. And so the thinking was, "If and when that happens, what are businesses going to need? Because they're all going to need it kind of at the same time." Even though it varied by city, a city like New York City, once information got communicated, everybody started planning on ... And of course, there were things that were still happening during the pandemic.
So very proud of the team. We shifted, we mobilized, and we were there for everyone to help them back. And 2022, '23, we definitely saw a big spike as everyone was trying to reopen and figure out what their kind of new normal ... I kind of hate saying that, but those are two words that kind of-
Kerry Diamond:
It does apply.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, exactly. And then in 2024 is really when we saw people shift their thinking to focusing on growth rather than just survival and recovery. And obviously I don't want to just paint rainbows and unicorns. There are a lot of tough decisions that were made. There are businesses that needed to reconcept or close on their partnerships that never realized or projects that got changed. And it seemed a lot of those kind of normalized in 2024 and the focus really was like, "What's next?"
Kerry Diamond:
The restaurant industry in general has been a welcoming place to immigrants. You know that. Both those here legally and illegally.
What do you think the effect will be of ICE raids and anti-immigration sentiment in the White House? I'm curious how this will impact restaurants. Are executives talking ... I know you're very close to a lot of people in the industry. Are they talking to you about this?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, this is definitely a big, big, heavy topic. You know, immigrants are such a huge part of the hospitality, working population industry.
Kerry Diamond:
Everyone says they're the backbone of the restaurant industry, but I think even that underestimates their role.
Alice Cheng:
Absolutely. And it goes beyond that. And I think where the ripple effects are going to be felt by everyone more aggressively are in the agricultural sector and other parts. And I think that ripple effect is also going to affect restaurants as well.
I think it remains to be seen. I think businesses have always been very cognizant about how to make sure they're following the practices and the laws and everything and protecting themselves and their teams. I think as rules and regulations and laws kind of change and evolve, it's kind of unpredictable right now. There will be people ... Everyone will feel the effects of this and the ripple effects of this unfortunately.
Kerry Diamond:
All right, I want to talk about you and your career. What was your first restaurant job?
Alice Cheng:
My first food-related job was at Everything Yogurt in the food court at the Nanuet Mall.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my God, Everything Yogurt. I remember Everything Yogurt. They don't exist anymore, do they?
Alice Cheng:
No, they don't. Everything Yogurt. I was so excited when I perfected my swirl. It's a technical twist of the wrist, but ... Yeah, that was $5 and 15 cents-
Kerry Diamond:
Full food court?
Alice Cheng:
... An hour.
Kerry Diamond:
An hour? It's amazing that you remember that.
Alice Cheng:
Yep.
Kerry Diamond:
And it was a food court?
Alice Cheng:
Food court. Food court in Nanuet Mall. And I worked there for about a year, I would say, when I was 14, 15. Whenever I got my work permit. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, you were like me. The second you could get your working papers-
Alice Cheng:
Oh yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
... Got those and I just started getting jobs left and right.
Alice Cheng:
That's right.
Kerry Diamond:
How about restaurants? Because you did go on to work in restaurants.
Alice Cheng:
I did. I did. I did restaurants and retail. I was working three or four jobs simultaneously. My next food and beverage job was at La Maisonette, which is a restaurant in the Pearl River Hilton, which is a kind of privately owned Hilton that was up on a hill in Pearl River. I worked in the restaurant. I was on brunch duty every Sunday-
Kerry Diamond:
You did brunch.
Alice Cheng:
... Clocking in at 5:00 a.m.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, 5:00 a.m.
Alice Cheng:
I did brunch and events. So every holiday I helped out. I was on the busing and the hostess side and cashier, and kind of helped out with serving and food prep when there were no shows. Got to do a little bit of everything and I loved that.
And I simultaneously worked with a catering company. I was a home waitress. So the catering company would get their orders and they would say, "Would you like a server to come to your house?" And I did that. That was very lucrative actually. So they would kind of deploy me. I would do two or three parties a weekend and ... You know when you're in high school and you're playing softball against somebody and now you're working their graduation party, and you're like, "Ugh?"
But it was great. It was great. I loved it. I enjoyed making my own money, I loved serving, and I liked that rush of just making people happy while they were enjoying themselves.
Kerry Diamond:
You made money and it built character.
Alice Cheng:
That's right.
Kerry Diamond:
You were going to be a professional musician, but wound up at FIT, the Fashion Institute of Technology here in New York City. I actually finished my degree at FIT. What kind of musician and why the pivot to fashion?
Alice Cheng:
I started violin when I was three. My parents were both musically inclined, but neither of them pursued music, so they kind of put that on me. I played violin for a while, then I started the piano. And then actually my mom was really big on me becoming a musician, so I kind of didn't love violin or piano, but I kept on doing it. And she passed when I was 10. I chose to switch to flute because that was an instrument that I liked and I wanted to continue with music. And because of my training, I actually picked that up pretty quickly and was going to be doing that for the longer term.
I kind of got to later stages. I did all the all-state competitions and everything and was great and I was teaching. And I was like, "This is just not for me." I was going to go on a scholarship somewhere and I decided very late that wasn't for me, and I said, "I'm just going to move to Manhattan and work." Because I wanted to get started. I've always been kind of a worker and I wanted to get into advertising.
FIT is a SUNY and they had a communications program. So I actually got into the communications program at FIT and needed to pay rent, so I got a temp job in the mail room at IBM.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. We've got a lot to unpack. Okay, so first thing, she said SUNY, State University of New York, the great SUNY system, which we both benefited from. But I just want to say I'm so sorry you lost your mom at such a young age.
Alice Cheng:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
Was it hard for you to move away from pursuing music professionally because you knew that was one of her dreams?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, it was a combination of I've never been a great test-taker and a studious person, and so somewhere along the line decided that, "Well, this would be a great way for me to continue and get into a great school," which was another strong push from both my parents. They immigrated here and we didn't have much, and they said, "You have to have a good education, and however you get there is up to you." Right? So I was like, "Oh, great. I can get into a great school via scholarship playing the flute and piccolo."
But I didn't want to play the flute and piccolo, and I think it really hit me when I was doing these auditions at all these great schools and I was looking at the requirements. I got pretty far with one of the schools and they're like, "Well, you have to major in flute performance and minor in flute theory and music theory, and you have to be in the marching band, which is year-round." And I'm like, "I don't want to do this."
And I think that's one of the things that I often say to other people is you have to take a step back and say, "Where do you see yourself five years from now? What do you actually want to do?" And it's okay to be like, "I don't know," but I feel like in that, "I don't know," you usually know what you don't want to do.
And so for me, I actually felt really strongly about being in advertising and I wanted to work in that. I felt that starting a school with a music scholarship would've set me back and I would've had to start over. And I've always been a very impatient person, so I was like, "No, I'd rather go faster." And I graduated college three years while I was working full-time at IBM, continuing my path down IBM because it was teaching me more than school was.
Kerry Diamond:
So was FIT more about communications and advertising versus fashion?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Alice Cheng:
Definitely-
Kerry Diamond:
Because you are a fashion girly.
Alice Cheng:
I-
Kerry Diamond:
Everybody who meets you knows you are a fashion girl.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, you know, it's definitely something that I enjoy, just like cooking and food.
The communications portion of the show is definitely what drew me more into it, and the fact that all the major advertising firms were here. And back then, I really wanted to be close to them and see how I could get my foot in the door.
Kerry Diamond:
So IBM is not the first thing people think of when they think of advertising and communications, right? But you get a job in the mailroom.
Alice Cheng:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
And that was to pay the bills.
Alice Cheng:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
But you stayed for almost 13 years.
Alice Cheng:
I did. I did.
So I really wanted to work at Ogilvy & Mather. I tried to get my foot in the door there and I couldn't. The HR person there gave me some really sound, direct advice and was basically like, "You're up against Harvard grads who are willing to make this very low salary because they're subsidized by their parents or whatever. You're not a Harvard grad, so try elsewhere." I said, "Thank you" and I moved on. And at that time, IBM was one of Ogilvy & Mather's biggest clients, and so I said, "Let me just get them on my resume and then go back and say, 'Well, I have client knowledge. I have unique whatever.' And maybe that'll help me get in."
Getting the mailroom temp job was to get my foot in the door. It was the only thing available, and I needed it to fit it into my school schedule because I'm in school full-time. After a couple months, I got actually offered a full-time job as an assistant, as a secretary.
I was running that mail, I will tell you. I was running that mail up and down the aisles and people noticed. I was helping out wherever I could. All the assistants back then, we were actually putting together binders for proposals. The manager of the assistants took notice and offered me a job. And I went full-time on the 57th and Madison covering the sports marketing and advertising division. So I supported the executives.
And that was awesome because I got to see all the projects. At that time ... I'm going to date myself. At that time, it was e-business. It was like 1999. And so I was seeing all these companies trying to figure out how to figure out the internet, how to get their businesses online; what is e-commerce? How do you set that up? And so it just opened my eyes up to technology enabling transformation of huge industries already.
And that led me one thing to another. You know, you work hard, you pay your dues. I got noticed and I got pulled into a startup within the company called Digital Media, which was focused on the future of unstructured content. And that really ... That took me to the West Coast. That took me working with all these different startups, Netflix included. And here we are.
Kerry Diamond:
So interesting. Now I have a better understanding of why you are so interested in career pathing.
Alice Cheng:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Alice Cheng:
That was-
Kerry Diamond:
You are a big example of-
Alice Cheng:
You know, I'm going to double tap into that because that has a lot to do with Culinary Agents, is that while I was at IBM, because of the way I started, I was an anomaly for them. I left there one of the youngest executives worldwide after 13 years, which was very rare because back then it was known that you spent 20, 30 plus years and you navigated your way and you relied on others to pluck you out and say, "You're ready for this next thing."
They started to struggle with recruiting young talent, because it was kind of at that time where the millennials were like, "I don't want to stay. I want to jump around and stuff like that." And so I was very intentional with forging my own path within the company, and I spent a lot of time mentoring others; not just young, but people that were kind of struggling through navigating it.
One of my mentors there, one thing he told me early on was, "Find the person that has the job that you want and figure out how they got there. Work your way back. Figure out what experiences and skills they needed to get there. Work on yourself." And I was like, "Oh, okay. Write that down."
Kerry Diamond:
Yet you really carved your own path within the company.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. I knew that I really wanted operations experience, I really wanted sales experience, like direct sales experience. I wasn't a technical person by trade. I really wanted to understand how to be a technical liaison, which is what I ended up being when I was at Netflix; working with clients, understand what their business goals and objectives and what they wanted to do, and then taking that information and gathering the right technical and consulting resources to bring to the table. And that enabled me to be able to build Culinary Agents initially by just some PowerPoints and some instructional bullets and being able to do that.
Kerry Diamond:
When did you have the idea for Culinary Agents?
Alice Cheng:
I had the idea probably six to seven years before I actually started it.
I was here, started working at IBM, doing my thing. One of my best friends who I met the days when I was working in retail, he was doing his ... I think it was his externship at the time at Le Cirque, all day. The bus would drop him off at the mall and he would do inventory at Banana Republic at night. And we became friends and we would also ... He became my eating buddy because I would save up all my money and then we'd go eat somewhere.
I naturally started helping him and some of his friends with resume writing and just opportunities, and I had the thought, I was like, "Oh, you kind of need something more than this." And then when I transferred out west and LinkedIn came onto the scene, I was like, "This is brilliant." And I used LinkedIn on the professional side at IBM. I was one of their early users. And so I saw it evolve.
I became friendly with hospitality folks on the West Coast as well. I feel like you just ... I gravitate. I love the people, the industry. And I realized that everyone was kind of complaining about the same thing. The talent were on Craigslist post-shift, kind of just scrolling through garbage and stuff that was all mish-mashed together. And businesses just dreaded having to post on there and receiving a ton of emails that didn't make sense. And I said, "There needs to be something that's more like LinkedIn meets Match.com for jobs, but really specific to this industry because there's so many nuances."
And at the time I was like, "Oh, somebody else will figure it out." And then I kept on doing my thing. I went back east. I took a global role, traveled for about three years to many different countries. And I was talking again to my friends and they're like, "No, it's still not here. You should just build it."
Kerry Diamond:
Did you start working on it before you left IBM? I don't know if you're allowed to say. IBM people, cover your ears.
Alice Cheng:
Yes. Yes, I did.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Alice Cheng:
I did. But I will say, back then, first of all, I was working like 80 to a hundred hours for IBM, so I have no qualms saying that I spent the little time that I had for myself working on this. But I will say back then also, there was no WiFi on airplanes, especially long-haul flights, and I traveled a lot. And so you're on a 17-hour flight, 20-hour flight, what are you going to do? And I'd be there doing PowerPoint, drawing notes and stuff like that.
Kerry Diamond:
Only so many movies you can watch.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I didn't have a backup plan. I didn't have a safety net. So I had to be working. And I spent all of my personal money to build Culinary Agents, including cashing out my 401k.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my God, we have so much in common. SUNY kids, working the second we could, happy making our own money. And I did the same. I fully broke into my 401k to do Cherry Bombe.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. You do what you need to do.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Alice Cheng:
And like I said, things pay off. Things work itself out in the end.
Kerry Diamond:
That is true. You only raised money once in 2015. I'm curious how that experience was.
Alice Cheng:
I did raise my series A in 2015. That was the last time I raised money.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Alice Cheng:
When I started out, after I kind of burned through my own stuff, you know, you have to prove that there's something here. You need something obviously to pitch to investors. And I raised a small friends and family to get me to a point where I had a working ... It was working. And I had customers. We were working with some of our initial groups; Daniel Boulud, Danny Meyer, Thomas Keller. So fortunate. And those who clearly were feeling, I would say more of the brunt of needing to sift through hundreds, thousands of resumes from a tool like Craigslist and still not getting really what they were looking for.
And it was working, but we clearly needed outside capital. And so I did the smile and dial, I went to conferences and-
Kerry Diamond:
Smile and dial. I've never heard that.
Alice Cheng:
I think it took about a hundred meetings to raise my first seed round, official seed round, and ...
Kerry Diamond:
It's so humbling.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. And things are different now, which I'm glad, but I'm also glad of how things worked out for us. After that, we raised a little seed extension and then an A.
It's interesting. That could be a whole other conversation, fundraising, as you very well know. Fundraising as a female founder and female founder minority has other complexities. But regardless, fundraising is difficult. It doesn't matter. And we were fortunate. You need one. You need one.
Kerry Diamond:
Mm-hmm. Can you say who some of your investors are?
Alice Cheng:
Yeah. RIE, which is a very well-respected more FinTech-focused fund, led our seed round back in the day. And Female Founders Fund was also in my first official seed round, and they're still in our portfolio today.
It was really that extra kind of confirmation, validation, if you will, from institutional money that really gives you kind of that extra nudge. But then that kind of sets the stage for the next phase, right? And if you get into the venture cycle, traditionally you raise money, you grow at all costs, you raise more money at a higher valuation, and so on and so forth until you have some sort of an exit.
So in the beginning, it's a very intense. It's always intense, but it's on top of trying to build the company and build your team and service customers and build the product. It's a lot, right? I'm preaching to the choir.
At some point, we reached a decision where we were up against people raising that were in hospitality, but they were in delivery and they were in a totally, totally different area, but we were fighting for the same dollar from the same investors. And investors who were wanting to get into, I'm doing air quotes, "food tech", were primarily interested in delivery companies and that whole space, which is totally understandable, versus a tool that was focused on HR and recruiting and helping people with careers in hospitality. And I had many different things said to me over the years, and everything made me stronger and more determined.
You know, we're very proud of where we are today. We were fortunate to be able to focus, double down on the company, make decisions that businesses make to have a sustainable business growing forward, and investing back in ourselves and growing. And this is going to be a really big year for us.
Kerry Diamond:
So tell us what's next for Culinary Agents.
Alice Cheng:
Well, I mentioned that we launched hospitalitycareerpaths.com in November of last year, which was very exciting. Next month, and you've heard it here first. I haven't told anybody yet, next month we'll be launching our podcast.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh, exciting.
Alice Cheng:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you hosting it?
Alice Cheng:
I am.
Kerry Diamond:
Very cool.
Alice Cheng:
And we're going to have to have you on.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Alice Cheng:
It's called Hospitality on the Rise, focused on career paths. So we just have leaders from the industry come and talk about themselves, which is great. I'm just there to prompt them; how they got to where they are, advice that they learned along the way, and really, really fortifying examples of how people have done it.
No two paths are identical, and if you want to make it and you're determined, the building blocks are kind of similar across the way no matter what path.
Kerry Diamond:
Right. Today Culinary Agents has been referred to as "the LinkedIn of culinary professionals." How can folks interact with your platform?
Alice Cheng:
Culinaryagents.com. It is free to create your profile; if you're looking for a job, if you are looking for just information, data, you want to do some research, you want to connect with employers. If you are hiring, you can create your free business profile, build up your employer brand, and post jobs and have an applicant tracking system for free and only pay if you need to advertise.
So we have really spent the better part of last year rounding out a lot of our technical product stuff. I don't want to say boring stuff. I mean, it's super exciting to me, but may not be as exciting for other people. And that was really important because we wanted to really make the tool available to everyone; not just businesses who had the budgets, businesses who may not need certain things. So it's a flexible system that really is for everyone.
And now we're doubling down on the people side and sharing these stories, and making sure that the professionalism continues to develop and grow and that the information gets shared with the aspiring and existing workers.
You know, there's a lot of different things for you. If you decide that this industry is not for you, that's also okay. Just know that whatever time and effort you've put into it, the skills that you've gained, they can apply to so many other industries. So it's not for nothing.
And that's something that I found talking to thousands and thousands of talent over the years is that ... I mean, it's tough. And sometimes when you're in the grind and you don't have time to lift your head up, or you have that time and you don't want to do anymore, it's easy to kind of get stuck a little bit.
And I think the thing that is obvious is that this industry, it's like the feeder of the working population in America. So many people have spent some time in this industry in some way, shape, or form. Whether that time was a little bit or a lot, the skills that you've gained, whether it's communication, problem-solving, cooking skills, whatever, can be applied to other industries.
Kerry Diamond:
It's so true.
Alice Cheng:
And that is more true now than ever.
Kerry Diamond:
When I look at resumes, if I see that someone has food service experience, I will put that on the good pile because it says a lot about people-
Alice Cheng:
Absolutely.
Kerry Diamond:
... And their communication skills and their work ethic, all those things.
But I also think what you said is a good reminder that at the end of the day, this industry is all about people. We might think it's about food and who's serving the best food, but it's really about people.
Alice Cheng:
Absolutely.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. We've run out of time, so we're just going to do one speed round question.
If you had to be trapped on a desert ... You're making a face. If you had to be trapped on a desert island with one food celebrity, who would it be and why?
Alice Cheng:
Ina Garten.
Kerry Diamond:
Ina. Good answer. Good answer.
Alice Cheng:
Well, I just think she just has this positive ... You know, when you look at her, you just want to smile. I definitely spent my fair share of watching Food Network back in the day. I just feel that she just had that real energy, this hospitality kind of running through her veins, and just finds a joy in ... At least that's ... I don't know her personally. Maybe one day I'll meet her. But that's what I get. And I feel like you can't fake that.
Kerry Diamond:
And she hustled when she had the Barefoot Contessa.
Alice Cheng:
Yes. Yes, yes. Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Did you read her bio?
Alice Cheng:
Not yet. Not yet.
Kerry Diamond:
Got to read it. Or listen to it. She narrates it.
Alice Cheng:
Oh, perfect. Even better.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah. Well, Ina's the Bombe and so are you, Alice. Thank you so much for coming on the show.
Alice Cheng:
Thank you for having me.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to check out past shows with superstars like Ina Garten and Caroline Chambers. You can listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Our theme song is by the band Tralala. Joseph Hazan is the studio engineer at Newsstand Studios. Our producers are Catherine Baker and Jenna Sadhu. And our editorial coordinator is Sophie Kies. Thanks for listening, everybody. You are the Bombe.