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Tell us about yourself What is something most people don\u2019t know about you? What does your company do? Where did the idea of your company come from? What sets you apart from your competition? How do you market your business? How do you “wow” your customers? What are one or two strategies for gaining customers that you have been successful with? How do you compete with competitors that are bigger than you? What is one of the biggest challenges you have had with your business? How did you overcome it? If you were to start again, what would you do differently? What is the one thing you would do over and over and recommend everyone else do? Is there a book that you recommend our community should read? Can you speak to your growth to this point? Why do you think it will continue? Where can you be found on the internet? As her company\u2019s name indicates, Wanderlust Delicato in Spokane, Washington, is deeply steeped in Amber Park\u2019s desire to explore the world. Wanderlust, she says, runs through her and her husband\u2019s veins: \u201cWe have found that when we can\u2019t travel, we can satisfy our lust with the experience of products unique to a region. Cheese, charcuterie, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":22869,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[169],"class_list":["post-22865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-success-stories","tag-window-decals"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
<\/strong>As a 38-year-old woman, I am beyond proud of myself for being a brave, dedicated, and hardworking business owner. I\u2019m happily married to my husband of 10 years, John, who also owns his own business. I have two beautiful young adult children, a yellow lab, and two cats. Working in fine dining for 20 years, I have developed my love, passion, and knowledge of wine, cheese, delicacies, and service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>I love maps, atlases, and travel \u2013I\u2019ve traveled the world and still want more. I\u2019m a political-science nerd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Wanderlust Delicato is a place to shop, eat, and learn. We have a full-service, cut-to-order cheese and charcuterie case. We offer an extensive selection of wines from around the world, and a gourmet teaching kitchen where we host cooking classes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>My love of travel, wine, and cheese!<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.signs.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/2-image2-Copy.jpeg\")
Leaning on Each Other<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Our customer service, experience, and selection. Our selection is focused on small-production, hard-to-find, unique, and traditional wines (we live in an area that produces a lot of wine!). Our competition, meanwhile, focuses solely on Northwest wines and high scores or value. In addition, our customer service is friendly and approachable, and our staff is incredibly knowledgeable and passionate about wine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Social media, word of mouth, wholesale, and print. Social media is especially big for us \u2013 we can target specific demographics, and cheese and wine make for great content. We sell cheese and charcuterie wholesale to other small businesses that promote sourcing from us on their menus, which serves to direct more customers to us. With print, we like to pass out informational flyers and cards and we also include these in our platters and boards so everyone enjoying them knows where to find us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>With our old-school customer service: I greet customers by name, I track customer orders, I personalize orders, and we offer the best experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>We collaborate with other small business. Part of this is with our wholesale program, another is buying wholesale from them for bread and specialty jams, p\u00e2t\u00e9s, and such. We also promote each other. Our business is located on Main Street in the heart of the downtown area, and our particular block is all small independent food and beverage businesses. So we lean on each other and promote each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>If I had to narrow it down, it\u2019s really all about customer service and knowledge \u2013 knowing people by name and being able to describe every item in the shop with detail. Large companies just can\u2019t do this, but we can, and our customers are loyal and love it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.signs.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/3-image3-Copy.jpeg\")
Listen to Your Gut<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Covid. We took a deep breath, masked up, and pivoted where we could. I participated in a local farmer\u2019s market this summer to get closer to customers. Plus, we offered more online preorder and curbside pickup; rearranged our dining area for retail sales; and we utilized a rooftop patio for outdoor cooking classes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Take a bit more time before opening, and hire a bookkeeper on day one. Taking my time to ensure I had detailed processes for every aspect of the business would have been helpful and way less stressful. Trying to do the books, train, work, sell, manage, etc. is too much \u2013 I would hire key positions for certain tasks rather than take it all on myself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Listen to your gut. Everyone has an opinion on what you should do and how you should do it \u2013 listen to their advice, but let your gut and your business plan guide you to make decisions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.signs.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/0-Wanderlust-Delicato-on-Main-best.png\")
<\/strong>The Wine Bible<\/em>, by Karen MacNeil \u2013 it\u2019s full of great information for the beginner or wine connoisseur.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>I have developed a very strong and loyal base of customers that want to love and share the experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/strong>Our website: www.wanderlustdelicato.com<\/a>. Also, on our Facebook page<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"