Sprite with Luxe Charcuterie

In this episode, I talk with Siam Fisaha, owner of Luxe Charcuterie, a Wilmington, Delaware-based catering business creating beautifully curated charcuterie boards, boxes and party platters for everything from intimate gatherings and thoughtful gifts to weddings and corporate events. After being inspired on a trip to Spain, Siam decided to switch careers and follow one of her passions...food! We talk candidly about the challenges of growing a business in a small market, why “old-school” customer service still makes a lasting impression, and how loyal clients can become one of your most valuable sources of new business. 

Go visit her website at https://www.luxecharcuterieshop.com/ and give her a follow on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/luxecharcuteriee/

Thanks for listening!  Follow us on Instagram @champagnestars1 and check out our site at www.champagneandstarsdecor.com

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to And I Like Large Parties. Join me as I chat with amazing women business owners in the events industry, some that I've worked with and some that I can't wait to work with. We'll be sipping cocktails while discussing their passions, hurdles, and accomplishments. You're gonna love it. Thanks for listening.

SPEAKER_02 0:16

I'm sitting down today with DM Fisaha. She is the owner of Lux Cutery. How are you doing? I'm good. Thank you so much for having me. Today, CM is just having water, keeping it simple, and I'm having Sprite. I always like to mention what we're drinking at the start. I like to let my guests give everybody like their website information, phone number, social media handles before we go ahead and dive in. So why don't you go ahead and tell people how they can reach out to you?

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Uh okay, so our um Instagram is Lux, uh Shakudri, C-H-A-R-I-E-E. And uh Facebook is the same. Um we are located in Wilmington, Delaware. Uh, our address is 1927 West 4th Street for pickups and like any other pickups.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

Okay, great. I am going to give you the chance to tell me how Lux came to be. If you want to share, you know, what you were doing maybe before that, if you're doing this full time, if you left a career, I just want to hear about your journey. How did you get to where you are?

SPEAKER_00 1:14

Oh, okay. Uh, we started uh luxury in 2020. Uh, before we started Lux Chair Corey uh a nurse, I graduated in 2018. I was working, uh, I did nursing home, uh, some med surge. Um, uh, that's like during COVID. Uh so how we started was uh in 2019, um, me and my partner were like, we love traveling. So we were in Spain, uh Madrid to be specific, and we went to this winery and uh they had this um like small like charcuterie boxes with uh like wines. So um when I had them, I was like, oh, this would be like an idea to like I was searching around like if there was anything around in Wilmington Delaware, and I haven't seen any uh individual boxes. Like I see some like Italian um like markets, they do sell charcuterie, but they didn't have any like small individual boxes. So when I came back in from uh Madrid in 2019, I was making them for my friends and family. And in 2020, specifically, before COVID happened, one of my friends, we supposed to go to a winery and then make our own like small uh chequeries to take it with us. And COVID happened, everything shut down. So um I felt really bad for her. So I just made her uh a box, like a really big box with like a wine, and then um I gave it to her. And I remember she posted to a Facebook group, and then I remember like a lot of people were asking her, um, saying, like, oh, where did you get this like box? Like, do they make this in momentum? And she kind of told me, Hey, like, there's a lot of people asking about this box, like, would you be interested in making them? But for me, I was I was like working in um the nursing field. I had no experience of uh like business experience or any catering or anything. So I just told her, like, oh, I'm not sure. Like, let me just think about it. That's how uh Luxhark Cooking started.

SPEAKER_02 2:56

All right. And so are you are you doing this full time or are you still working in nursing?

SPEAKER_00 3:00

I'm doing it full time. So full time. Um yeah, I quit my um nursing job, so I'm doing it full-time right now.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

Nice. You said that you were your career was a nurse, but like, do you have any experience with cooking or food preparation?

SPEAKER_00 3:14

Nothing? Uh well, I grew up in a big family. Um always cook, uh, we always have like family gatherings, so food is like a big part of my culture. Uh so we always cook, like we always had uh family like dinners, so I always love to cook, and um, but I I didn't have any like um formal like training.

SPEAKER_02 3:33

How do you perfect the the technique for how beautifully everything is cut and carved? And is that just practice over time?

SPEAKER_00 3:43

Uh I would say it's more practice over time, but for me it's all um like I love um like presentation, like beautiful presentation. Um it's just I feel like you can tell a lot of story by just presenting food in a, you know. Um so I feel like I I do like practiced a lot before I even started the like the business. Uh even though I had the idea in 2020, we didn't start until 2021 because it took a lot of um like just opening a business, um trying to find a kitchen and stuff. So it took a while kind of perfecting my technique. Um, I'm very like visual perception, so I love beautiful things. Like I love food travel and like everything that is just beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 4:24

Yeah. The presentation of the charcuterie when it's on a grazing table is stunning. And I've also seen your stuff in the boxes. Um, there was an event in the fall, actually, that I was at, and I saw these little boxes, they were so beautiful, and they were um s'mores kits. Oh s'mores, uh yeah, and I saw the luck shark kit. I was like, oh my god, I know her. So even that, the little s'mores kits were just like impeccably packaged.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

You have kids? Uh yeah, I just had um so I just had a baby, uh, she's nine months. Um just uh yeah, so she's a girl.

SPEAKER_02 5:01

So just the one, just one kid. So what's that been like for you? Balancing business and motherhood?

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Um, I mean, it's now I'm kind of adjusting. It was hard at first, but now um I do have like um a team, so it's getting like I'm adjusting to it, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:17

That's good. My kids were older. I mean, my son is he's 17 now, my daughter's 13, and I've been doing this for five, six years now. So they were already kind of old enough. They were babies when I started. I can't imagine having a a newborn and trying to navigate running a business. So uh I'm impressed. I'm impressed by you.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

Thank you so much for all that. It's all about like having a village and like I have a good uh support system.

SPEAKER_02 5:43

So that's great. That's great. So you mentioned um a kitchen. So you guys are located, like you have a commercial kitchen that you work out of?

SPEAKER_00 5:50

Yeah, in Wilmington, um close to uh little Itali area, like um Union and like uh fourth street. So that's where uh most of our pickups happen if people want to pick up the orders. Uh we don't do um pickups like uh the same day, but we do you could pre-order and that's where uh we do like uh pickups.

SPEAKER_02 6:08

Gotcha. You mentioned just trying to get the business going and getting the kitchen. Tell me what that was like for you, trying to acquire a space and just that process.

SPEAKER_00 6:15

It was very challenging. Um, I think that was like the most challenging because, like I said, when we first started, we were renting a commercial kitchen and it would be like $25 to $30 per hour. Um, there's not a lot of commercial, like I think there's just one that opened like recently, but before when we started in 2021, there was not much commercial kitchen or collective kitchen where you can like you know come and like do your catering or you could do your um so there was one kitchen that we were working, um it would cost us 25 to 30 uh dollars an hour. And sometimes it would be uh there would be other people like renting at the same time. So it was very, very challenging. Uh we have to plan ahead of time. We couldn't take order like the same day or like 24 to 48 hours. So it was very challenging until we find the space that we are right now.

SPEAKER_02 7:00

And the space that you're in right now, are you it that's just solely for you? You're not sharing it with anyone? No, we're not sharing it. So okay, that's great.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

Um, what is your most popular item? Uh, I would say the most profitable is uh grazing tables. We do uh individual boxes, but uh our grazing table is the most popular one.

SPEAKER_02 7:20

Okay. How do you so if someone calls you and they say, Oh, we're having you know 55 people, what's the process for figuring out how much pepperoni and cheese? And is it a formula that you use? Did it take a while to get that downpacked?

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Uh usually it's one feet for 10 people, like one feet of uh grazing table for 10 people, or if if it's more than that, and what we do is two ounces of like meat or cheese, two ounce of meat and two ounce of cheese for one person. So that's how we calculate. Let's say if we have 50 um people, then we need like 100 ounces of like cheese because it's 20 um person, yeah. Sometimes it's easier to tell people um like like one feet would like feed 10 people.

unknown 8:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

If they did like uh six feet, that would feed like 60 people, or if they did like four feet, that would feed like 40 people.

SPEAKER_02 8:14

What is the largest or longest, I should say, like grazing table that you've had to prepare food for?

SPEAKER_00 8:21

I would say the biggest we did was uh 18 feet, it was a very big uh grazing table. JP Morgan Chase uh event, and I think that was the biggest we did. It was like 400 something people, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:35

So if someone wants to order a grazing table um at like for an event in their home, you'll come into the home and you'll you'll set everything up for them.

SPEAKER_00 8:43

Yeah, so we would have um we pre uh pre-cut most of our stuff. Uh it would be uh on a cooler and then we bring it to the house and then set it up on the table.

SPEAKER_02 8:51

You set it up. Okay. Do people get to choose what kinds of meats and cheeses they want, or do they trust you?

SPEAKER_00 8:59

But we do have seasons and seasonal meats. But if you like um if people are specific, hey, I want machego or I want I can only eat uh certain types of cheese, then like we could work with that.

SPEAKER_02 9:10

That's great. Uh you make other things besides you do uh tell me more about the other catering that you do.

SPEAKER_00 9:17

So we just start adding that uh after um so um with the chequeer, it was um when we started first, it was mostly uh like seasonal like events. And then we decide okay to uh look into other different like kinds of income. Um so we start making individual um like lunch boxes. Those are very popular with uh offices or like any corporate um, so they come with like uh sandwiches, like some types of cheese, some fruit uh cubs and stuff. So that's how we started, but uh we do more than uh cheese right now, like we do more than shake or eating.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

Okay. So at the start of this, when you were getting into it, um you said that there weren't many places that were doing it. What does that landscape look like now? Are there more people in the business that you're in? Talk to me about that.

SPEAKER_00 10:05

There is more people in the business. Um, I see like a lot of um, it's I know it's a small um um a small uh state, like small city, but uh I do see like a lot of people are coming. But like I said, um it's it's very um how do I say it? Um like it's a very challenging um kind of business. Like I see people starting and then kind of stopping, but there is still like people in the business now, like that they're opening it.

SPEAKER_02 10:29

Yeah. What would you say sets your business apart?

SPEAKER_00 10:33

Uh for me, I really focus on um like repeated like customers. Our business, like how it works is um like how I set it up is I focus on volume, even though uh we don't compromise quality, but we focus on volume. So, for example, if you go to other um charcuterie companies, you can see they sell one small or like one medium board for like $200. But we um we ours is like the most um expensive one is $70. I know it's like a low um margin, but at the same time we get more orders. I get more repeated clients. Uh so I focus on volume instead of pricing myself really high. Yeah, that's what we focus on. Okay. And then also to um what I focus more is on accessibility. So our boxes range from like $15 up to like $70 or like $350 is the smallest um raising table we have. So as a person, you don't have to wait for a special event or you don't have to wait for, you know, and like something to happen. You could always like we have people ordering for like a date night, uh, just like friends night, wine night, like the prices range so there's like more accessibility for them.

SPEAKER_02 11:42

Yeah, so you you have something at every price point for folks. That that's good. What would you say is like your if somebody were starting a charcuterie business, and I know you just talked a little bit about how you price things and and what your philosophy is, what would be it like a a good pricing tip for someone that is starting?

SPEAKER_00 12:04

Like I said, it's really hard, like it's challenging to get like into uh commercial shipping. So you really have to include like your uh labor and stuff, but I would say um try to focus on getting um like repeated clients because you could get one order, like let's say um you price yourself really high, you could get one order a month or a week. Uh especially when you start like when I first started, my boxes were really cheap, but slowly, like when you uh start getting clients, then you can add like prices and people are okay with that, you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:35

I know for me, like it's always a challenge balancing like profit with cre creativity. Um, I see things and I'm like, oh, I really want that. But I have to think to myself, okay, like is that going to make me money? Am I going to, you know, I'm in event rentals. Am I going to be able to rent that? Um, how do you balance just I guess wanting beautiful things and and just being so into the creative display?

SPEAKER_00 13:01

Yeah. With profit. Sometimes it's very challenging. Like you said, I love like beautiful things. And sometimes when I have like an event, I'm like, oh, I want this, I want to buy this, I want to like, you know, I want it to be like perfect. And then like I'm not really like making that much profit. But like I try to see if if the team would um let's say if it's um how do I explain? Let's say we did um last time we did um like we need a poo uh team, right? So every time like I buy something, I'm like, I hope it's something that I could use for the next like client. So I can reuse uh the items and stuff.

SPEAKER_02 13:36

Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

That's how I kind of uh because I I I like you said, like I love doing like creative things, but at the same time, like I have to like pay my stuff and profit. And so you have to include that, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:47

Yeah, sometimes it's a struggle wanting to do something on a scale that um the client's not necessarily paying for. And then, you know, do I want that to come out of what I'm making? Yeah, um, you know, out of my profit. It's hard to balance that sometimes.

SPEAKER_00 14:02

And then it makes it really challenging when you're in a small market, like I feel like in Wilmington or like in Delaware in general, we're in a small market because I do see other like people that do check with in a different, bigger uh market, they're able to charge like a lot of money. But um it really depends on like on the market, right? I don't want to compromise luxury too because it's a small market.

SPEAKER_02 14:24

I think that you really you brought up a good point there. Understanding where you're located, understanding your market, the demographics, all of that stuff that's really important and how you price your services. Speaking of marketing, what would you say are like some of your favorite marketing strategies?

SPEAKER_00 14:39

To be honest, I haven't done a lot of marketing. It's uh for me, it's um just making sure like when I get a new client, like I really take care of them so I can get like a repeat of uh uh clients. It's always been like word of mouth. We haven't paid uh that much money for uh like any marketing or influencers or anything, it just being word of mouth. And I'm very like intentional. I know it's like old school, but every time we do bigger events, um I always send like a thank you uh cards. Like I know it's um yeah, really like it's just like going to basics.

SPEAKER_02 15:11

I'm the same. I think the word of mouth is important, and um, I do send I send clients a thank you card. Yeah, I make sure that it's something I'm handwriting, nothing computer generated, just you know, to kind of bring in what you said, that that human, that human touch, that extra customer service going that extra mile. Would you say that word of mouth and repeat clients? That's that's marketing. How about social media? Like what are you finding works for you?

SPEAKER_00 15:38

So we did have um a social media manager, um, but when I had the baby, we kind of have to pivot some things. Um, so I would say, I mean, Instagram is working fine. Like um, we do have uh Facebook, uh, we haven't had like any ads or anything, but yeah, like just mostly um email marketing. I feel like email marketing is the one that is working for us. I haven't been posting that much actually on Instagram. It's just been very um like I'm still trying like learn the Instagram thing.

SPEAKER_02 16:09

Yeah, it's also I think there's a lot of pressure on us. You know, I the people that we follow, the these other businesses, not even local. I mean, even just some national brands. I mean, they're posting a couple of times a day.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

Yeah. And it's like, who has the time for that and the energy? But I'm like, I don't know, like I'm like it's very, very Yeah, it's also the skill.

SPEAKER_02 16:29

Like, I don't feel like I have the skill for it either.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

That's what's effective versus what's not. Yeah, I'm like good at making sure like a grazing table looks good or a box looks good behind, but I'm not really good at like just you know, posting. Like I'm not good at social media. So my goal for this year is to um hire someone that can like, you know, do social media for us.

SPEAKER_02 16:52

What's the most extravagant request that you've had for a grazing table?

SPEAKER_00 16:57

Um I had a client, um, I'm not sure exactly what Christmas. It was a few Christmas ago. Um, and she has um like a huge budget. Um, she wants like the most beautiful grazing table, and she had like her budget was very high. I would say like four to five thousand, and she just wants the most beautiful things in there. It was a very beautiful uh grazing table.

SPEAKER_02 17:19

Have you ever had any odd requests? Like just something out of the box?

SPEAKER_00 17:23

Um, well, not really out of the box. I had someone um like a vegan, like a whole vegan grazing table. That was very challenging. Try to find um like the source, um, like all kind of vegan cheese, but it was manageable. But that was a little bit odd. Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:39

That's cool. Your team, you've mentioned your team a couple of times. Tell me about your team.

SPEAKER_00 17:44

Uh I have two girls, they have been with me since uh 2023 now. So they're part-time, they go to um school, like they're in c uh college, so they just do this part-time. And uh during the summer or the holidays when we get busy, they do it full-time. Um, they've been really like supportive during postpartum. Like, I wouldn't have been able to do it by myself.

SPEAKER_02 18:06

Yeah, that's great that you have that. How about your partner? Do you also work with your partner or they have their own career?

SPEAKER_00 18:13

Uh, he has his own career, but okay, you know, when you run a business, like your partner is part of the like he's always you will see him like delivering boxes.

SPEAKER_02 18:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:22

Yeah, he's like um unpaid employing of me.

SPEAKER_02 18:25

Yeah, yeah. My husband's the same.

SPEAKER_00 18:27

The same thing, yeah. Same way, same way.

SPEAKER_02 18:31

It's good. So you mentioned delivery. Obviously, if you've got a large order and you have to go and you've got to set it up, like I get that. You and your team are on site and you're doing all that. What about if folks just wanted to order the um smaller boxes? Is that something that you deliver or is that pickup only?

SPEAKER_00 18:48

Yeah, so our system is like I say, for me, it's more about like accessibility. I want people to have a chance to try our boxes. So we do free delivery up to 15 miles. So we could go up to like bear, middle town. It depends like how how far the 15 miles is. So that's free delivery included with our boxes. Gotcha. So we work with a company called Allow Me Errand. So um they're I usually do the deliveries, or one of my team will do um the deliveries. But if we've gotten really busy and we have other orders, uh, we work with them, like we have been working with them for a few years now.

SPEAKER_02 19:20

Okay. Have you ever had um a client unhappy with what you've done? And like how did you how do you manage that or how do you handle it?

SPEAKER_00 19:28

Um, I mean it's food. So like sometimes there's like um we had so how it works is like I said, delivery. Um, whoever orders the box, there's um kind of a like um a note that says, oh, somebody have to be home, or sometimes there's nobody at home, but like the driver can't wait. Like we can't make uh we tried to make sure like somebody's at home. But we did have a client one time, we left the box outside and uh it was around springtime, and then there was like ants, so it like it was a um branch box and there was a lot of ants in there, like she was not happy. So we it's fine, like we always remake it, like we wanna make sure like everybody's happy. Sure.

SPEAKER_02 20:05

You mentioned one of your goals is bringing on a new social media manager. What are some other uh short-term goals that you have right now?

SPEAKER_00 20:12

I'm trying to see if I can do uh like workshops, you know, checkery workshops. Uh we did like a few uh in 2023, but it just got really busy. So um the workshops they usually request them during like holiday season. So we kind of focus on uh instead of workshop, we just focus on like boxes and raising tables and like events. But that's one thing I'm looking into. And we're trying to do um, I don't know, last time when you were at the Galantines um event, we are trying to start a new um, so it's like a live mozzarella experience. So we're still working on that.

SPEAKER_02 20:45

Yeah, that was amazing. I didn't want to bring it up because I didn't know if it was something that you wanted to talk about. But yeah, it's it was great.

SPEAKER_00 20:51

And um, like we're kind of getting ready uh to launch and we're gonna how about like long-term goals?

SPEAKER_02 20:58

Like, what do you see for your business maybe five years out?

SPEAKER_00 21:02

To be honest, we're trying uh like the place that we are right now, there's a space, so we are trying to utilize the space and see if we can do um how do I say like a gourmet um store, and then if people can come and like you know, pick up like or make their own charcuterie. Okay, that's cool. I'm working with different farmers around us that uh we could carry their items on our store. So we try we're moving into the store-based um business model.

SPEAKER_02 21:26

Yeah, I love that. That sounds amazing, and what a great opportunity that would be for you know, folks that do have honey and the farmers, you know, like kind of cool. Supporting, you know, other local businesses. Yeah, that's great. What's your favorite kind of cheese? Um, Montega is my favorite cheese. I love that too. So, roughly how long does it take you to set up like a decent size grazing table?

SPEAKER_00 21:50

Um, I would say an hour to an hour and a half. Um, if it's a small board, I would say 45 to an hour to make sure everything is set. Uh, if it's six feet and apt, then I would say an hour to an hour and a half. So we get to the client's house like five, ten minutes early, just making sure like to see the space that we're gonna uh set up the grazing table. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

So if you could go back and maybe tell your younger self something, some advice about like life, something you've learned already having been in the healthcare industry and now a business owner, what advice do you think you would give her?

SPEAKER_00 22:24

I would say like everything works out at the end. I mean, like we're always um, it wasn't always like a direct um way uh to the life, but I feel like uh then like everything works out. I feel like God has um a plan for us. So I'm like that's what I would tell her. Everything works out and God has a plan for you. Yeah, sounds good.

SPEAKER_02 22:42

All right. So before we started talking, I mentioned that I always like to ask my guests what signature cocktail or mocktail could be coffee, can be tea. Would they say represents who they are or their business, their brand? What would that be for you?

SPEAKER_00 22:57

I think for me it would be uh peach bellini. That's my favorite thing.

SPEAKER_02 23:01

Okay, that's my mother's favorite drink, actually.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

Yeah. Yeah, it's related, but I just love the taste of it. Like I make that often at home, so that's my favorite thing. Cool.

SPEAKER_02 23:10

Yeah, I love that. And they're it they're pretty, you know, they're aesthetic to look at when they come out. Yes. All right. Remind everybody how they can get in touch with you if they wanted to reach out and talk to you about catering an event for them.

SPEAKER_00 23:22

Okay, so you they can reach out through our Instagram um or up, like our DM is always open. Um, we're at Lakshakudri, L-U-X-E-C-H-A-R-C-U-T-R-I-E on Instagram and Facebook. And our email is Lakshakri at 2020 at gmail.com. And they can reach out uh 302-3588932. That's our phone number. Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 23:43

All right. Well, I appreciate you sitting down with me. Um, I like to end the podcast with a toast. I'm going to Toast2 Success in 2026. I really wish you well with you know the goals that you've set forth. And I I can't wait to see what you do in the future with all of these big plans.

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Thanks for having me, and I'm like excited. Like, um, I hope we can collaborate one day.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

Um, I would love that. Yeah, I would love it.