Today we’d like to introduce you to Jet Thaggard.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Johanna and I both received our Masters degree in Nutrition at the National University of Natural Medicine. During our time in school, while training alongside professional nutritionists and naturopaths who were prescribing new diets to their patients, we realized there was a gap in care — too often, patients lacked the time or wherewithal to adopt these drastic changes into their everyday routines, so the compliance rate was not as strong as it could be. If these patients had access to holistic chefs who were well trained in accommodating various diets and using food as medicine, surely this would improve their success rate. Thus, Gather Around Nutrition – a nutritionist-led private chef business – was born.
But we always aspired to do more than just one-on-one private chef work. For the holistic health of our bodies and our environment, we believe strongly in using foods that are grown or raised locally, humanely, and sustainably. We noticed a lack of catering companies that were dedicated to these values, and we wanted to be a link in the chain of getting organic, locally-sourced foods to people’s plates. So at the beginning of 2020, we launched our healing foods business, with a few retreats to cater already booked on our calendar.
Unfortunately, just a week or two later, the pandemic hit, and all of our future events were abruptly canceled. We spent the next few months brainstorming ideas to keep our new little business afloat. One of these ideas was to offer postpartum care packages full of nutrient-rich meals, snacks, healing broths, and herbal teas to support the postpartum mother. We figured there would still be people giving birth, and since their friends/relatives would be unable to travel to support them, we could fill in the gap with our holistic chef services. We also began offering personal chef services, with customized meals prepared out of our own kitchen and delivered directly to our clients. By the end of 2020, we had accumulated enough ongoing clients that we began hiring and training other like-minded chefs to join our team.
Now, 6 years later, we have a multifaceted business that includes farm-to-table event catering, postpartum care packages, customized meal prep services, as well as a weekly Meal Prep Club for people who have flexible diets and just want to have meals throughout the week that are healthy, fresh and farm-direct. We have grown to a team of 8 amazing chefs with shared ethos and similar cooking styles. Our business has grown organically each year, which we’ve managed to do without ever compromising on our values of top quality sourcing and livable wages for our chefs.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Not exactly. The first year was very bumpy, as we had to adopt entirely new business models to accommodate the restrictions imposed on us by the global pandemic. We also had to adjust our pricing structure each year to keep up with unprecedented inflation. Without having any seed money to start the business, we were operating on a very tight budget in the first few years, so we were constantly stretched thin trying to manage all aspects of the workload ourselves. Also in those early years, we could only afford to rent commercial kitchen space on a per-diem basis, so we were constantly hauling stuff around town and spending an obscene amount of time gathering every ingredient and supply we would need to prep for any given event. It was truly exhausting, yet we persevered!
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
Gather Around Nutrition is a private chef business based in Portland, Oregon, built by holistic nutritionists. We offer Meal Prep Services, Event & Retreat Catering, and Postpartum Care Packages. With a passion for environmental sustainability, we are committed to low-waste & low-impact business practices, sourcing directly from local farmers, ranchers, and fisherfolk, and creating menus that highlight the benefits of eating with the seasons. Our meal delivery services make healthy eating easy & fun by providing you with constantly rotating menus inspired by world cuisines that are packed full of nutrition and tailored to your specific diet to support your wellness goals. For our catered events, we use the freshest seasonal and organic produce directly from local farms to provide you with a unique seasonal menu for events, big or small. We source 100% from local farms for these events so your guests can experience the bounty of seasonal variety the Pacific Northwest has to offer. You can rest assured that by choosing us, you will be supporting not only your own health but also our local farmers and food economy.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
Most of our team of chefs, including owners Johanna and Jed, have also worked in the field on organic farms! Because of this, we have a deep appreciation for the hard work that goes into organic, sustainable agriculture, and we love working with unique varietals of vegetables that grow well in the Pacific Northwest.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.gatheraroundnutrition.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/gather_around_nutrition
