June 7, 2021 • 22 mins
Like so many food industry workers, Meg lost her job during the pandemic. And instead of going back on the job hunt in this historically challenging environment, she decided to gamble on herself. She launched Das Butterhaus (https://dasbutterhaus.com), named for her love of German pastries - and now she's baking in a local kitchen and selling her delicious concoctions for pickup and delivery. Learning how to be an entrepreneur - bookkeeping, marketing, etc. - at the same time she's standing up her new business has been all consuming, but she's relishing her newfound contact with her customers.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
This is on the Job, a podcast about finding your
life's work. On the job, is brought to you by
Express Employment Professionals. This season, we're bringing you stories of
folks following their passion to carve their own career path.
During the pandemic, the restaurant and service industry have changed immensely,
and in the wake of these changes, tons of weight
(00:27):
staff and cooks and managers and caterers have all lost
their jobs. Well, today we talked to a baker who
lost hers, but instead of looking for a new job,
she's creating her own. The sound you're hearing is the
start of a new business just getting sort of. It's
(00:51):
a sound of a standing mixer making chocolate chip cookies.
So they're just salted chocolate chip cookies. It took me
like two months to get this right. My had to
try something here. They are not just salted chocolate chip cookies.
They are a masterpiece, lovingly and maybe obsessively concocted in
Meg's kitchen. Meg Dawson, I'm thirty years old, I am
(01:13):
a baker, and I own operate and bake at Doss
butter House. Oh my god, I know it's not good
to eat on an audio, but this is one of
the best cookies right now in COVID. Meg is baking
(01:37):
in a commercial kitchen where she lives in rural Charlotte, Vermont.
Doss Butterhouse is her first business. She just started selling
baked goods for pickup and delivery. She's been baking for
a long time, but for the first time she is
doing it her way. Cookies are so controversial. I think
that melted butter in a chocolate of cookie is like
(01:57):
the only way to go. It's a consistent bake every time.
She cares a lot, and it's clear when you taste
her food that it just feels like this is a
person who's deep in a creative process. They're still gooey
in the middle with crispy edget like that. It's just
like a perfect cookie every time, and people are like,
cream your butter. As we set up top. The restaurant
(02:17):
service industries, they've taken a huge hit during the pandemic,
and Meg, like many people who worked in culinary, had
their career a bit derailed by the pandemic. But instead
of looking elsewhere for a job, she's doubling down and
frankly thriving. You really you don't seem like you're wasting
much time in this pandemic. Um. I'm so grateful to
be able to make cookies like like it's like my
(02:42):
six year old child's dream. Like you can work with
cookies and chocolate your entire life if you wanted to.
For money, people will pay you to make cake. Isn't
that awesome? Okay to hear more about my story and
(03:06):
how she got here taking this leap of faith with
Doss Butterhouse. I sat down with her outside the kitchen.
Are you going to make hear me a sound? With
her two black cats, Hobart and corners like the mixer
and cornishan like the pickle. She lives here in Charlotte
with her fiance, not far from the kitchen she bakes in.
She definitely found her place in this tight community here.
(03:28):
But she's originally from the South. I was born in
New Jersey, but I grew up in Richmond, Virginia. Yeah,
definitely a weird kid. Definitely have been cooking my whole life.
I was like that weird kid that would like bring
risotto to like a potlock in sixth grade. That's so weird.
It's super weird. But people loved it. It's cheesy, it's delicious.
(03:53):
Me grew up in a household of cooks. Her dad cooked,
her mom cooked, But my grandmother was like an amazing
half amazing, Like she would watch Julia Child and then
go into her kitchen and make that for dinner. Like
she would be like ironing, watching it and then being
like I can do that, and then just start making
(04:13):
like she was like a five star chef. She was
watching Julia Child, you were watching her. Yeah, yeah, basically.
So even though Meg was the weird Risotto kid, she said,
she went to a pretty nerdy high school and fit
right in there. School where for your senior year you
pick your own mentorship at a job. In the real world,
most people would do their mentorships at like a doctor's
(04:35):
office or like a law office. And I asked if
I could do it in a restaurant, and they're like, sure,
whatever you want. That was like my first intro into
like actual kitchens. So you love cooking, but you've never
been like in the food culinary kitchen world. What was
it like when you get thrown into the fire. It
was a totally I mean, when you cook at home,
(04:55):
it's a totally different experience because you're cooking for yourself
and so you can screw up as many times as
you want to. But when you're cooking in a kitchen,
and especially in like a small, like family owned thing,
it's like you can't really mess up. That's their money,
that's somebody's business, and there is a slim margin of error.
And where that might have been a daunting environment for
(05:17):
a regular teenager to step into, Meg was hooked. I
loved it. I loved being in a kitchen. I loved working.
I loved I know this is gonna sound stude, but
it makes you feel important, Like it makes you feel
like you're doing something for a reason, and like that
was kind of the first time that I felt like
I was good at what I was doing. Meg played
(05:40):
sports in high school, but said she was never the
best on the team. She was a good student but
usually got bees. But in the kitchen, she felt like
she excelled and she felt right at home and accepted
they thought it was cool that I was the weird
Risotto kid. I mean, like if like it felt right.
(06:01):
She started off college at BU. She then transferred back
home and went to University of Virginia. While working at
two restaurants. Basically worked like forty hours a week at
two different jobs and went to school. And then I
graduated and immediately moved to New York. What you got there?
She applied for about twenty five jobs and restaurants before
(06:22):
she even got one break. I've got a job working
with a really amazing pastry chef. I never wanted to
do pastry, like I was always uh cook and I
never thought pastry was where I was going to go.
I thought like, I'll take this for a couple of months,
I'll figure out what I want to do, And turns
out I loved it. For Meg, this was a new
(06:44):
medium she could express herself with, like cooking, but more organized.
It made it really fun to be creative. I could
take these very specific ratios. It's like, you know that,
like this plus this plus this makes this like a
very specific it comes out the same every time. From that,
you can kind of morph it into what you want
(07:06):
to do. So she kept working in different kitchens, each
time picking up on more aspects that helped her understand
the business more and more, and she eventually found her
way to Vermont, where she ended up landing a huge
gig running the bakery and an esteemed farm and restaurant
in Charlotte, where she could only make a menu based
off of what was seasonally available at local farms around her.
(07:28):
To have to think, like that is so great for
your brain and it's so great for creativity. You thrive
when you have constraints to work with them. Yeah, exactly. Yeah,
like having parameters where it's like, okay, like you only
have rhubarb for two weeks. Good luck. By the time
she got into the swing of things at this farm restaurant,
Meg already had a decade of experience. This was a
(07:50):
great job, but by this point she knew enough about
baking and about the business itself to start concocting her
own ideas. I felt like there were parts of myself
that I was like tamping down constantly, which is just
what you do when you work for someone else. Is
like you're constantly doing what other people tell you do,
and that's part of the job. Meg was running the
(08:13):
kitchen here when COVID hit, and like most restaurants, hers
pivoted to pick up and delivery and they were slammed.
It was especially now when she got overworked that she
started squirreling away ideas for Doss Butterhouse a dream bakery
where she had the freedom to make what she wanted
to make, which had like sprinkles and like salt and
(08:34):
all of these things that like I loved um and
especially like during COVID it was almost like a coping
mechanism of like being so insanely busy that I wanted
to cry, and then coming home and like thinking about
what I would do better if I did it myself.
And then late she got hit by a rogue wave.
(08:57):
Even though the restaurant had one of the best season
had ever had, they started letting people go. Yeah, they
laid off a huge part of their staff, including myself.
There were a lot of really amazing people that I
worked with. It was really surprising and really sad. Yeah,
it kind of sucked. What were your initial feelings when
(09:21):
you think I can conflantly say a workaholic, Um, well,
suddenly without a job and a job that you were
very intimately tied to running this entire kitchen, I I
kind of and this, I don't. I know that a
lot of people wouldn't do this. I basically, within like
(09:43):
three days, was like, Okay, I've been thinking about Doss
butter House. I guess I'll just make dossboter House a thing.
She did make Doss butter House a thing, in case
you're wondering. The awesome name is inspired by German pastries
and her love for pretty much all things German. I
was really inspired by like Grimm's fairy tales with like
the gingerbread House, where it's just like a big plable
(10:05):
house full of butter instead of candy, because I don't
like candy. I like better. Meg was laid off in October,
so she was looking down the barrel of starting Dust
butter House in the holiday season. I knew that the
big thing I wanted to do was Thanksgiving, though, because
I knew that Thanksgiving was like, it's a huge thing
in Charlotte. It was a huge thing at the farm.
(10:27):
The farm where she had just worked sold about sixty
pies that last Thanksgiving, which is a lot for this
little community. I just kind of started putting the word
out that, like, they're still gonna be pies in Charlotte.
Nobody worried this is gonna be fine. Dust butter House
is here to say Thanksgiving. Suffice to say it did.
(10:48):
And so we had a hundred thirty pies. You as yourself.
Dust Butterhouse sold more pies over double what we made
the farm the year before, full restaurant that you had
worked out before. She started doing events, gathering equipment and researching, licensing,
learning QuickBooks, all the things you've got to do to
(11:08):
start a business, and the whole time baking like a madwoman,
posting up at a local restaurant that lets her bake
in the kitchen and set up a table for pick
up at the front door. So what was the initial response.
I think people loved it. I have a lot of
repeat customers, like every week repeat customers, which is really
really nice. Besides loving her community and wanting to serve
(11:29):
them on a personal level, she was making her first
awesome decision as a business owner. The farm she worked
at was known for their pastries in Charlotte, and that
went away. Meg was now filling a gap in the
market in the best way possible. Yeah. When I started,
it was like I want everybody here to know that,
like pies are gonna be fine. You're gonna have pies
(11:51):
and you're gonna have cookie boxes, Like no one is
going to forget about you. We'll get back to our
store in a second. First, a word from Express Employment Professionals.
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sweats over the details. This is you. But to get
(12:14):
an honest day's work, you need a response, You need
a call back, You need a job. Express Employment Professionals
can help because we understand what it takes to get
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a person invested in your success. At Express, we can
(12:37):
even complete your application with you over the phone, will
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you a job at Express. We can put you to
work with companies of all sizes and industries, from the
production floor to the front office. Express Nose Jobs, get
to No Express. Find your location at Express dot com
(13:01):
or on the Express Jobs app. Now back to on
the job. Back in the kitchen where we started this episode,
Mega's finishing up baking and putting together some orders for
pickup during the holiday season. Her pies blue people away
and the community is really rallying around her. Now, even
(13:22):
six months in and the variety of pastries she's putting
together today is mouth watering. These are like a nutty
and current ruggle off. This is the lemon poppy orcott case.
These are the chocolate brownies with hazel nuts, and there's
like hazelnut praline kind of throughout it. She's of course
got those insane chocolate chip cookies from earlier with big
flaky salt on them. She's got a crazy delicious banana
(13:45):
bread cake with milk, chocolate, butter cream and hints of coffee. Oh,
the pecan tart. There's candies, two more oranges in it.
Um a little bit of time and a little bit
of honey. And these nice little cardboard boxes tied up
with thread. They look like you're giving away a little presents.
People treating themselves. It's hard right now. It's hard out there.
(14:07):
Just as we're talking, a woman comes in to pick
up her order. Her name is Charlotte. He's getting lemon
poppy cake and the banana bread cake. My family is
addicted to Meg's baking so inventive. It's like, I can't
even fathom how delicious everything is and how creative. I
would say my favorite was Thanksgiving magnate a chocolate silk
(14:29):
pie that is literally the best thing I ever ate.
She also raised about the scones, which she says live
up to the Doss Butterhouse name, Like you know, there's
like a stick of butter in each one, but it's
so worth it. Yeah you don't care, Yeah, exactly, It's
really good. Do you pick up every week? I do?
I do. This is such a great addition to the
(14:49):
area to have this quality of pastry and cakes and inventiveness.
You know, there's nothing like this around here. So what
Meg is doing is fantastic. Charlotte really lingers for a
few minutes, box in hand with endless compliments. Meg is
standing about ten feet away while Charlotte turns from me
(15:11):
to her, raving about her food from the New York area,
and this is the kind of stuff like you go
to New York City and buy and pay sixty dollars.
I can see that Meg is kind of rubbing her
hands together, smiling out her mask and saying thank you.
It's kind of obvious that she's a little uncomfortable. It's like,
I really recognize, like, not only you so talented, but
(15:33):
the quality and what you're doing is amazing. Yeah, yeah,
how do you feel now that you're finally making these
things you've been creating in your head this whole time
and seeing people buy them? It's so complicated. It's such
(15:53):
a complicated emotion because I have always worked in a basement,
and like I would meet people that would be like,
oh my god, you're the baker. Oh that's so exciting,
and like that's really nice to hear it. But it's
like it's really overwhelming when it's oh, what you mean
is you you were removed from the customer for all
(16:15):
these years? Yeah, and so like that. It's like the
face to face interactions. I mean, I get really uncomfortable
when people like even say like I like your shoes.
So when it's something that like you've put your heart
and soul into, like your whole life. I mean, like
even Charlotte earlier today she was she was telling me
how much she loved all your food, and she's very
(16:36):
emphatic about it in front of you. How did that
make you feel? Well? While she was saying all that.
I don't know if you saw me, but I was
like basically like up against the wall. Yeah. I almost
cried then too. It's hard it's like really great, but
it's also it's scary because it's I think it puts
(16:59):
a lot of pressure not to fail, and I'm somebody
who really really tries hard not to fail. So it
just like adds on this other level of like, now
they know who you are, your business is you? What
(17:19):
do you think? Will you buy my stuff? Like? What
do you do? You like my stuff? Do you like me?
Because my stuff is me? So it's like you need
that response like you in order for your business to continue.
It's like you need be able to be like, yes,
I like your stuff and I'll buy it. So, like
(17:41):
it's not just putting yourself out there, it's so much
more than that. Meg Dawson has taken a huge risk
venturing off on your own and starting a business in
any time. Covid Aside is kind of a crazy thing
to do when you look at it on paper. There's
so many new skills you need to learn just to
(18:02):
do the thing you started the business for in the
first place, and then still anything can happen. But Meg,
that's what working in restaurants has always been for her, chaos,
except this time it's hers. I have never felt more
creatively free I've never felt more connected to the farmers
(18:24):
that were like I'm using, I've never felt more connected
to my other friends who have businesses. So far, I
haven't screwed up too big, but like, I know that
that's on the horizon um and I just have to
be like ready and okay with it. Maybe it's not
surprising she's got such a good star. Meg's always thrived
(18:45):
under constraints, figuring out how to express herself within the
parameter she's been given. That's just her personality, But I
think there's something in that we can all take a
piece of. This pandemic has totally changed our fundamental understanding
of work and what we do. It's put a lot
of us without work, or made us see that those
(19:07):
jobs we thought would always be there could go away
at any time. That's scary, But the reality is jobs
aren't going away. They're just changing inevitably, and that leaves
each of us with a choice to be afraid of
this big, scary, changing world or figure out how to
evolve and thrive within it. A lot of us, maybe
(19:35):
even you listening, we found ourselves out of a job
and thinking about doing something totally different, making your own job,
and then immediately thinking it's too risky. Who knows what
the world will look like even a year from now.
But the thing is doing what you love for work
has always been risky and always will be and anything
(19:56):
could always happen any time. Yeah, that is owning a
business is is you're just constantly pivoting and constantly looking
at what worked and what didn't and moving forward like
you have to move forward. Life is just uncertain and stressful.
(20:17):
And even with all the stress of starting Duss Butterhouse,
when Meg is feeling overwhelmed, do you remember something she
was told during her first big pastry job back in Manhattan,
words of wisdom from her baking mentor Caitlin. The first
time I burned an entire batch of cakes, she threw
it away and she goes, it's a lesson in loss.
(20:38):
It's just cake. And I think about that like every day,
anytime anything is going bad. It's like I am like
a child. I'm playing with cookies all day, Like this
is the best job, Like how many people get to
do that for on the job. I'm otis gray to
(21:07):
see all of Meg's amazing pastries and follow her business
as it grows, find her on Instagram at DOS Butterhouse.
We'll put a link for this in the description of
the show. Thanks for listening to On the Job, brought
to you by Express Employment Professionals. This season of On
(21:28):
the Job is produced by Audiation. The episodes were written
and produced by me Otis Gray. Our executive producer is
Sandy Smallens. The show is mixed by Matt Noble for
Audiation Studios at The Loft and Bronxville, New York. Music
by Blue Dot Sessions. Find us on I Heart Radio
and Apple Podcasts. If you liked what you heard, please
(21:49):
consider rating and reviewing the show on Apple Podcasts or
wherever you listen. We'll see you next time. For more
inspiring stories about discovering your life's work, Ariation
This is on the Job, a podcast about finding your
life's work. On the job, is brought to you by
Express Employment Professionals. This season, we're bringing you stories of
folks following their passion to carve their own career path.
During the pandemic, the restaurant and service industry have changed immensely,
and in the wake of these changes, tons of weight
(00:27):
staff and cooks and managers and caterers have all lost
their jobs. Well, today we talked to a baker who
lost hers, but instead of looking for a new job,
she's creating her own. The sound you're hearing is the
start of a new business just getting sort of. It's
(00:51):
a sound of a standing mixer making chocolate chip cookies.
So they're just salted chocolate chip cookies. It took me
like two months to get this right. My had to
try something here. They are not just salted chocolate chip cookies.
They are a masterpiece, lovingly and maybe obsessively concocted in
Meg's kitchen. Meg Dawson, I'm thirty years old, I am
(01:13):
a baker, and I own operate and bake at Doss
butter House. Oh my god, I know it's not good
to eat on an audio, but this is one of
the best cookies right now in COVID. Meg is baking
(01:37):
in a commercial kitchen where she lives in rural Charlotte, Vermont.
Doss Butterhouse is her first business. She just started selling
baked goods for pickup and delivery. She's been baking for
a long time, but for the first time she is
doing it her way. Cookies are so controversial. I think
that melted butter in a chocolate of cookie is like
(01:57):
the only way to go. It's a consistent bake every time.
She cares a lot, and it's clear when you taste
her food that it just feels like this is a
person who's deep in a creative process. They're still gooey
in the middle with crispy edget like that. It's just
like a perfect cookie every time, and people are like,
cream your butter. As we set up top. The restaurant
(02:17):
service industries, they've taken a huge hit during the pandemic,
and Meg, like many people who worked in culinary, had
their career a bit derailed by the pandemic. But instead
of looking elsewhere for a job, she's doubling down and
frankly thriving. You really you don't seem like you're wasting
much time in this pandemic. Um. I'm so grateful to
be able to make cookies like like it's like my
(02:42):
six year old child's dream. Like you can work with
cookies and chocolate your entire life if you wanted to.
For money, people will pay you to make cake. Isn't
that awesome? Okay to hear more about my story and
(03:06):
how she got here taking this leap of faith with
Doss Butterhouse. I sat down with her outside the kitchen.
Are you going to make hear me a sound? With
her two black cats, Hobart and corners like the mixer
and cornishan like the pickle. She lives here in Charlotte
with her fiance, not far from the kitchen she bakes in.
She definitely found her place in this tight community here.
(03:28):
But she's originally from the South. I was born in
New Jersey, but I grew up in Richmond, Virginia. Yeah,
definitely a weird kid. Definitely have been cooking my whole life.
I was like that weird kid that would like bring
risotto to like a potlock in sixth grade. That's so weird.
It's super weird. But people loved it. It's cheesy, it's delicious.
(03:53):
Me grew up in a household of cooks. Her dad cooked,
her mom cooked, But my grandmother was like an amazing
half amazing, Like she would watch Julia Child and then
go into her kitchen and make that for dinner. Like
she would be like ironing, watching it and then being
like I can do that, and then just start making
(04:13):
like she was like a five star chef. She was
watching Julia Child, you were watching her. Yeah, yeah, basically.
So even though Meg was the weird Risotto kid, she said,
she went to a pretty nerdy high school and fit
right in there. School where for your senior year you
pick your own mentorship at a job. In the real world,
most people would do their mentorships at like a doctor's
(04:35):
office or like a law office. And I asked if
I could do it in a restaurant, and they're like, sure,
whatever you want. That was like my first intro into
like actual kitchens. So you love cooking, but you've never
been like in the food culinary kitchen world. What was
it like when you get thrown into the fire. It
was a totally I mean, when you cook at home,
(04:55):
it's a totally different experience because you're cooking for yourself
and so you can screw up as many times as
you want to. But when you're cooking in a kitchen,
and especially in like a small, like family owned thing,
it's like you can't really mess up. That's their money,
that's somebody's business, and there is a slim margin of error.
And where that might have been a daunting environment for
(05:17):
a regular teenager to step into, Meg was hooked. I
loved it. I loved being in a kitchen. I loved working.
I loved I know this is gonna sound stude, but
it makes you feel important, Like it makes you feel
like you're doing something for a reason, and like that
was kind of the first time that I felt like
I was good at what I was doing. Meg played
(05:40):
sports in high school, but said she was never the
best on the team. She was a good student but
usually got bees. But in the kitchen, she felt like
she excelled and she felt right at home and accepted
they thought it was cool that I was the weird
Risotto kid. I mean, like if like it felt right.
(06:01):
She started off college at BU. She then transferred back
home and went to University of Virginia. While working at
two restaurants. Basically worked like forty hours a week at
two different jobs and went to school. And then I
graduated and immediately moved to New York. What you got there?
She applied for about twenty five jobs and restaurants before
(06:22):
she even got one break. I've got a job working
with a really amazing pastry chef. I never wanted to
do pastry, like I was always uh cook and I
never thought pastry was where I was going to go.
I thought like, I'll take this for a couple of months,
I'll figure out what I want to do, And turns
out I loved it. For Meg, this was a new
(06:44):
medium she could express herself with, like cooking, but more organized.
It made it really fun to be creative. I could
take these very specific ratios. It's like, you know that,
like this plus this plus this makes this like a
very specific it comes out the same every time. From that,
you can kind of morph it into what you want
(07:06):
to do. So she kept working in different kitchens, each
time picking up on more aspects that helped her understand
the business more and more, and she eventually found her
way to Vermont, where she ended up landing a huge
gig running the bakery and an esteemed farm and restaurant
in Charlotte, where she could only make a menu based
off of what was seasonally available at local farms around her.
(07:28):
To have to think, like that is so great for
your brain and it's so great for creativity. You thrive
when you have constraints to work with them. Yeah, exactly. Yeah,
like having parameters where it's like, okay, like you only
have rhubarb for two weeks. Good luck. By the time
she got into the swing of things at this farm restaurant,
Meg already had a decade of experience. This was a
(07:50):
great job, but by this point she knew enough about
baking and about the business itself to start concocting her
own ideas. I felt like there were parts of myself
that I was like tamping down constantly, which is just
what you do when you work for someone else. Is
like you're constantly doing what other people tell you do,
and that's part of the job. Meg was running the
(08:13):
kitchen here when COVID hit, and like most restaurants, hers
pivoted to pick up and delivery and they were slammed.
It was especially now when she got overworked that she
started squirreling away ideas for Doss Butterhouse a dream bakery
where she had the freedom to make what she wanted
to make, which had like sprinkles and like salt and
(08:34):
all of these things that like I loved um and
especially like during COVID it was almost like a coping
mechanism of like being so insanely busy that I wanted
to cry, and then coming home and like thinking about
what I would do better if I did it myself.
And then late she got hit by a rogue wave.
(08:57):
Even though the restaurant had one of the best season
had ever had, they started letting people go. Yeah, they
laid off a huge part of their staff, including myself.
There were a lot of really amazing people that I
worked with. It was really surprising and really sad. Yeah,
it kind of sucked. What were your initial feelings when
(09:21):
you think I can conflantly say a workaholic, Um, well,
suddenly without a job and a job that you were
very intimately tied to running this entire kitchen, I I
kind of and this, I don't. I know that a
lot of people wouldn't do this. I basically, within like
(09:43):
three days, was like, Okay, I've been thinking about Doss
butter House. I guess I'll just make dossboter House a thing.
She did make Doss butter House a thing, in case
you're wondering. The awesome name is inspired by German pastries
and her love for pretty much all things German. I
was really inspired by like Grimm's fairy tales with like
the gingerbread House, where it's just like a big plable
(10:05):
house full of butter instead of candy, because I don't
like candy. I like better. Meg was laid off in October,
so she was looking down the barrel of starting Dust
butter House in the holiday season. I knew that the
big thing I wanted to do was Thanksgiving, though, because
I knew that Thanksgiving was like, it's a huge thing
in Charlotte. It was a huge thing at the farm.
(10:27):
The farm where she had just worked sold about sixty
pies that last Thanksgiving, which is a lot for this
little community. I just kind of started putting the word
out that, like, they're still gonna be pies in Charlotte.
Nobody worried this is gonna be fine. Dust butter House
is here to say Thanksgiving. Suffice to say it did.
(10:48):
And so we had a hundred thirty pies. You as yourself.
Dust Butterhouse sold more pies over double what we made
the farm the year before, full restaurant that you had
worked out before. She started doing events, gathering equipment and researching, licensing,
learning QuickBooks, all the things you've got to do to
(11:08):
start a business, and the whole time baking like a madwoman,
posting up at a local restaurant that lets her bake
in the kitchen and set up a table for pick
up at the front door. So what was the initial response.
I think people loved it. I have a lot of
repeat customers, like every week repeat customers, which is really
really nice. Besides loving her community and wanting to serve
(11:29):
them on a personal level, she was making her first
awesome decision as a business owner. The farm she worked
at was known for their pastries in Charlotte, and that
went away. Meg was now filling a gap in the
market in the best way possible. Yeah. When I started,
it was like I want everybody here to know that,
like pies are gonna be fine. You're gonna have pies
(11:51):
and you're gonna have cookie boxes, Like no one is
going to forget about you. We'll get back to our
store in a second. First, a word from Express Employment Professionals.
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sweats over the details. This is you. But to get
(12:14):
an honest day's work, you need a response, You need
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to No Express. Find your location at Express dot com
(13:01):
or on the Express Jobs app. Now back to on
the job. Back in the kitchen where we started this episode,
Mega's finishing up baking and putting together some orders for
pickup during the holiday season. Her pies blue people away
and the community is really rallying around her. Now, even
(13:22):
six months in and the variety of pastries she's putting
together today is mouth watering. These are like a nutty
and current ruggle off. This is the lemon poppy orcott case.
These are the chocolate brownies with hazel nuts, and there's
like hazelnut praline kind of throughout it. She's of course
got those insane chocolate chip cookies from earlier with big
flaky salt on them. She's got a crazy delicious banana
(13:45):
bread cake with milk, chocolate, butter cream and hints of coffee. Oh,
the pecan tart. There's candies, two more oranges in it.
Um a little bit of time and a little bit
of honey. And these nice little cardboard boxes tied up
with thread. They look like you're giving away a little presents.
People treating themselves. It's hard right now. It's hard out there.
(14:07):
Just as we're talking, a woman comes in to pick
up her order. Her name is Charlotte. He's getting lemon
poppy cake and the banana bread cake. My family is
addicted to Meg's baking so inventive. It's like, I can't
even fathom how delicious everything is and how creative. I
would say my favorite was Thanksgiving magnate a chocolate silk
(14:29):
pie that is literally the best thing I ever ate.
She also raised about the scones, which she says live
up to the Doss Butterhouse name, Like you know, there's
like a stick of butter in each one, but it's
so worth it. Yeah you don't care, Yeah, exactly, It's
really good. Do you pick up every week? I do?
I do. This is such a great addition to the
(14:49):
area to have this quality of pastry and cakes and inventiveness.
You know, there's nothing like this around here. So what
Meg is doing is fantastic. Charlotte really lingers for a
few minutes, box in hand with endless compliments. Meg is
standing about ten feet away while Charlotte turns from me
(15:11):
to her, raving about her food from the New York area,
and this is the kind of stuff like you go
to New York City and buy and pay sixty dollars.
I can see that Meg is kind of rubbing her
hands together, smiling out her mask and saying thank you.
It's kind of obvious that she's a little uncomfortable. It's like,
I really recognize, like, not only you so talented, but
(15:33):
the quality and what you're doing is amazing. Yeah, yeah,
how do you feel now that you're finally making these
things you've been creating in your head this whole time
and seeing people buy them? It's so complicated. It's such
(15:53):
a complicated emotion because I have always worked in a basement,
and like I would meet people that would be like,
oh my god, you're the baker. Oh that's so exciting,
and like that's really nice to hear it. But it's
like it's really overwhelming when it's oh, what you mean
is you you were removed from the customer for all
(16:15):
these years? Yeah, and so like that. It's like the
face to face interactions. I mean, I get really uncomfortable
when people like even say like I like your shoes.
So when it's something that like you've put your heart
and soul into, like your whole life. I mean, like
even Charlotte earlier today she was she was telling me
how much she loved all your food, and she's very
(16:36):
emphatic about it in front of you. How did that
make you feel? Well? While she was saying all that.
I don't know if you saw me, but I was
like basically like up against the wall. Yeah. I almost
cried then too. It's hard it's like really great, but
it's also it's scary because it's I think it puts
(16:59):
a lot of pressure not to fail, and I'm somebody
who really really tries hard not to fail. So it
just like adds on this other level of like, now
they know who you are, your business is you? What
(17:19):
do you think? Will you buy my stuff? Like? What
do you do? You like my stuff? Do you like me?
Because my stuff is me? So it's like you need
that response like you in order for your business to continue.
It's like you need be able to be like, yes,
I like your stuff and I'll buy it. So, like
(17:41):
it's not just putting yourself out there, it's so much
more than that. Meg Dawson has taken a huge risk
venturing off on your own and starting a business in
any time. Covid Aside is kind of a crazy thing
to do when you look at it on paper. There's
so many new skills you need to learn just to
(18:02):
do the thing you started the business for in the
first place, and then still anything can happen. But Meg,
that's what working in restaurants has always been for her, chaos,
except this time it's hers. I have never felt more
creatively free I've never felt more connected to the farmers
(18:24):
that were like I'm using, I've never felt more connected
to my other friends who have businesses. So far, I
haven't screwed up too big, but like, I know that
that's on the horizon um and I just have to
be like ready and okay with it. Maybe it's not
surprising she's got such a good star. Meg's always thrived
(18:45):
under constraints, figuring out how to express herself within the
parameter she's been given. That's just her personality, But I
think there's something in that we can all take a
piece of. This pandemic has totally changed our fundamental understanding
of work and what we do. It's put a lot
of us without work, or made us see that those
(19:07):
jobs we thought would always be there could go away
at any time. That's scary, But the reality is jobs
aren't going away. They're just changing inevitably, and that leaves
each of us with a choice to be afraid of
this big, scary, changing world or figure out how to
evolve and thrive within it. A lot of us, maybe
(19:35):
even you listening, we found ourselves out of a job
and thinking about doing something totally different, making your own job,
and then immediately thinking it's too risky. Who knows what
the world will look like even a year from now.
But the thing is doing what you love for work
has always been risky and always will be and anything
(19:56):
could always happen any time. Yeah, that is owning a
business is is you're just constantly pivoting and constantly looking
at what worked and what didn't and moving forward like
you have to move forward. Life is just uncertain and stressful.
(20:17):
And even with all the stress of starting Duss Butterhouse,
when Meg is feeling overwhelmed, do you remember something she
was told during her first big pastry job back in Manhattan,
words of wisdom from her baking mentor Caitlin. The first
time I burned an entire batch of cakes, she threw
it away and she goes, it's a lesson in loss.
(20:38):
It's just cake. And I think about that like every day,
anytime anything is going bad. It's like I am like
a child. I'm playing with cookies all day, Like this
is the best job, Like how many people get to
do that for on the job. I'm otis gray to
(21:07):
see all of Meg's amazing pastries and follow her business
as it grows, find her on Instagram at DOS Butterhouse.
We'll put a link for this in the description of
the show. Thanks for listening to On the Job, brought
to you by Express Employment Professionals. This season of On
(21:28):
the Job is produced by Audiation. The episodes were written
and produced by me Otis Gray. Our executive producer is
Sandy Smallens. The show is mixed by Matt Noble for
Audiation Studios at The Loft and Bronxville, New York. Music
by Blue Dot Sessions. Find us on I Heart Radio
and Apple Podcasts. If you liked what you heard, please
(21:49):
consider rating and reviewing the show on Apple Podcasts or
wherever you listen. We'll see you next time. For more
inspiring stories about discovering your life's work, Ariation
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