Today we’d like to introduce you to Soraya Spencer and Nicki Hamilton.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Soraya and Nicki. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Soraya Spencer: From the age of 9 years old I was already working in our family’s restaurant washing glasses standing on a step stool. I grew up with the love and the passion of being a restaurateur! I ended up studying at Institute Paul Bocuse for a Bachelor’s Degree in Hospitality and Restaurant Management in Lyon, France. The school allowed me to gain a lot of knowledge and additional experience like being part of the opening team of Lyon restaurant for the Shanghai Word Expo 2010. I flew to Hong Kong after receiving my diplomas and worked there for 5 years where I helped open 5 restaurants with amazing people!
When my husband and I moved to Dallas, I knew I was going to open a restaurant. I met Nicki Hamilton over dinner and we connected right away. We started sharing our ideas and Gather Kitchen was born! We spent a year working on our recipes, concept and design. Gather Kitchen is truly all what we believe food should be!
Nicki Hamilton: My background is in fashion, but I always took a personal interest in wellness and food. I started to develop the concept for Gather Kitchen when I was living in NYC. I began cooking a lot and realizing that with small changes I could create versions of my favorite foods that were better for me, but without sacrificing taste. When I moved to Dallas, I met my business partner, Soraya Spencer. From the moment we met, we started talking about the concept of Gather Kitchen. Soraya lived in Hong Kong prior to Dallas and opened five restaurants there. With our shared ideas and her expertise, we knew we were on to something.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
There is no such thing as an “easy road” but it surely was fun no matter what we had to face! A lot of testing and perfecting of our recipes, for one.
I would say that the most complicated part was finding a location. Knowing that location is the key to a restaurant’s success added extra stress as we are new to Dallas and had to learn the city. Gather Kitchen fills an actual need here in Dallas so we wanted to make sure that we would be where people needed us to be. We were very fortunate to have great brokers, Greg Pierce and Ryan May over at CBRE. They patiently helped us to find the perfect location for Gather Kitchen.
We believe Thanksgiving Tower is the best location for us!
Please tell us about Gather Kitchen.
Gather Kitchen is a fast-casual dining experience, where we offer local and seasonal ingredients. Customers order in line and their bowls are assembled right in front of them. Once they check out, they can leave or dine in with a fully prepared, warm, satisfying breakfast or lunch.
Guests can customize their meals to make them whatever they want them to be. There are plenty of Whole30, Paleo, Vegetarian and Vegan options, but there are just as many options that are simply prepared and delicious! We have six different scratch-match sauces, all without refined sugar or additives. You wouldn’t believe how often sugar is unnecessarily added to your favorite sauces. Personally, we prefer to eat our sugar in cake!
We cater to everyone’s food preferences and tastes. I think one of my favorite moments was when we did a tasting with our now Landlord and he said, “I was skeptical about trying your Zoodles Bolognese, but I think I like this better than pasta.” At Gather Kitchen, you can satisfy your cravings but still feel good.
Who else deserves credit – have you had mentors, supporters, cheerleaders, advocates, clients or teammates that have played a big role in your success or the success of the business? If so – who are they and what role did they plan / how did they help:
Soraya Spencer: I truly believe that everyone that I worked with during my career played a role and helped to get me to where I am today, opening Gather Kitchen. My experiences in France and Asia were very humbling and forged the idea and philosophy that I have about food and hospitality. And of course, my husband has been the greatest supporter of this adventure since day one, he certainly enjoyed most of the food tastings!
Nicki Hamilton: My father has been extremely helpful along the way. He has invested in restaurants for the past 30 years and has always been very involved in the projects. Cooking and the restaurant industry is a passion of his, so naturally when I told him about Gather Kitchen he was ready and willing to help. He has overseen everything from the initial business plan to finding a location.
Also, our husbands who have been our biggest cheerleaders since the start and are always willing to help in any way they can.
We also have to acknowledge Brent Rodgers, over at Roots Juices. He owns both the Lakewood and Oak Lawn locations of Roots and he has been carrying our bites, cookies and muffins for over a year now. It has been great working relationship, one we plan and hope to continue once we open our own brick and mortar restaurant.
And of course, our customers! We have filled personal orders and have had repeat customers reach out to us. It means so much every time we receive an e-mail, message or even a like on Instagram!
Contact Info:
- Address: Thanksgiving Tower
Ground Floor, 1601 Elm Street
Dallas, TX 75201 - Website: www.gatherkitchen.com
- Email: info@gatherkitchen.com
- Twitter: @gatherkitchen
- Instagram: @gatherkitchen
Image Credit:
Shumaila Chauhan
@muddychoux
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