My first professional job was to sell heavy-duty waterless cookware.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
After years of working in professional kitchens, and then spending so much time in a lot of different home kitchens, I realized that there's a huge gap in the market where you have people who develop cookware but who don't actually cook.
I was a very good cook, and I knew I could build a business.
I spent a long time working in restaurants and making no money. It was very character-building, but I think it could have been built in a shorter time.
I did all kinds of things as a young person to try to make money. I had a chicken operation - I sold chickens. I can remember going to high school football games as a ten-year-old and gathering Coca-Cola bottles, 'cause you'd turn them in and get a nickel. I wanted not to remain idle.
Once I was unemployed and didn't have money, you can't just go to dinner. The onus is on you to learn to cook... I learned how important the right equipment is.
I did a business in a box called College Pro Painters. They taught you how to paint houses, how to hire and fire, how to sell, how to deal with customers. You got a one-year franchise. It was the hardest year of my life in terms of hard work. I won manager of the year. It was very successful.
I spent several years cooking on a line.
My first job was cleaning sheep pens.
I used to sell furniture for a living. The trouble was, it was my own.
I was dishwasher, then promoted to chef in a local kitchen in a restaurant in Seattle, and I was working on a building site as well, putting in insulation and painting houses, and then doing some classes at a community college nearby.