We met Flannery and Lauren in the same East Village coffee shop where they first met four years ago. Their company, Big Little Get Together, is a fully-customizable personal chef service based in New York City, but they say they can work anywhere in the world as long as there is a working kitchen and the freshest ingredients. Over espresso, they told us the story of their business’s whimsical origins and how it has developed into a multi-dimensional culinary powerhouse. Their creativity often extends beyond the kitchen. They have thrown several themed dinners inspired by popular movies and TV shows like, Mad Men, American Psycho and the films of Wes Anderson. After talking to the ladies, it became clear that Flannery and Lauren possess a tangible love for food and the culinary arts. In business, when you love your craft as much as they do, it’s hard to go wrong.

What is Big Little Get Together?

Flannery: It’s a personal chef and intimate catering service. We offer specialized in-home and on-site dining. We do private dinner parties, cocktail parties, and theme-based dinner parties, which are a lot of fun. But, we can really do anything under the sun. We are totally tailorable and customizable. All of our menus are done on a per-job, per-customer basis. We don’t have set menus that people choose from. So, it becomes a very intimate experience between the client and us.

Where are you from and how did you get to where you are now?

Lauren: I grew up in Southern California and moved to New York to go to art school to become a professional dancer. I did this for four years. Once I graduated, I had that moment of realization of, “What the fuck am I going to do with my life?” So, I went to Europe, came back, reconsidered everything and fell in love with food. Flannery and I met casually in this coffee shop. We became friends. Then, I went to Italy for the summer and worked in a restaurant. That trip sealed the deal. I knew this was what I wanted to do. It enabled me to incorporate my creativity and also work with something that I was very passionate about. It was really organic how everything came together. It’s been a learning process ever since.

Flannery: I’m from Greenwich Village in New York City. I’ve always been an eater. I’ve always eaten a lot of unusual foods. I grew up with New York at my fingertips and my parents were pretty experimental—experimental for the early 80’s. Sushi and Indian food were regulars and I cooked a lot with my family. I’ve always kind of been obsessed with food. Lauren and I are almost the same age and food network got big when we were adolescents. It was interesting and intriguing to me. For some reason, I was that weird kid that was into educational television. I didn’t even cook that much but I soaked in everything I saw. When I was in college, I started cooking a little more. Then, I met Lauren and discovered we shared a passion for food. If you love food, you’re going to figure out someone else loves food within the first hour you talk. She went to Europe and I was very eager to learn everything she learned. When she came back, she started to teach me some of the more savory recipes. Then, we started cooking together and our business grew out of that.

How did you guys turn your passion for cooking into a business?

Lauren: It has been an evolution. When we first started the company and got our LLC and insurance, we really didn’t know what we were doing. We learn something new every day. First and foremost, our cooking technique has changed and grown drastically. The business sense, the interpersonal relationships and the budgeting are all things that we’ve had to learn and are still learning. When we decided to start the company, it was on a complete whim. We had just done food for this huge party, were drunk and we came up with the name. We liked each other and decided to make it happen. We got more and more passionate about challenging ourselves. As far as turning our passion into a business, I wake up in the morning and I think about food. If you talk to anyone who loves what they’re doing or has started a business, it’s all they think about. There are days when you’ve been on your feet for 18 hours, you’ve dealt with people, things have gone perfectly and things have gone wrong, but it’s nice to sit down afterward and say, “We just fed people and it was our food.” It’s pretty awesome.

How do you differentiate yourselves from the competition?

Flannery: We are different. First of all, we’re us. We both did a lot of work in the front of house before we moved to the kitchen. We have a lot of respect and appreciation for the personal, and intimate aspect of the experience. We don’t hide in the back.

Lauren: We define ourselves by what we’re not. We are not caterers, we are not personal chefs and we are not a restaurant. We are trying to bridge the gap between these. A good way to think of us is like if your mom or dad were a really great cook and you had to pay them. We make sure that everything is taken care of so you don’t have to. We take care of everything from the temperature of the room to the music that’s playing to making sure you have something to take with you that is a piece of us. So, that’s what’s different about us. We don’t just think about reservations, we don’t just think about dietary restrictions or groceries, we think about everything. It’s made especially for you.

Flannery: We really care. Because we’re passionate about what we do and it’s our names and our product, we’re never going to put something out that we’re not proud of. At the end of the day, if we’re doing a big job and we’ve made some hors d’oeuvres and we taste one and it’s not right, we’re not going to send it out. We’re only going to send you something that we’re proud of and tastes good. We pride ourselves on quality and we’re not afraid of telling clients, “No, we can’t do that.”

Tell us about your creative process and inspiration.

Flannery: It depends on the job. It starts with an initial conversation with the client where they tell us what they’re looking for, how many people are coming, and the occasion. We ask them about the things they like, the things they don’t like, and their favorite restaurants. Then, it’s really fun because we take all of that information and start planning. We always use seasonal items and try to buy as locally and organically as possible. Ultimately, our cooking isn’t that complicated. We let the ingredients stand out. The other type of party we do is our invite-based party, which we throw. Our inspiration starts with the space. Then, we figure out an appropriately matched theme for the space. If it’s based on a movie, we’ll watch the movie and figure out how we can incorporate what’s in the movie into the food. After we make the menu, there are a lot of other fun things to decide, like a music playlist. When the guests walk in, they are transported into a different world.

Lauren: For us, doing the dinner parties is like our version of a restaurant. We both have creative backgrounds. I do all the invitations, so I get to do graphic design. Once we pick a theme, I also do all the table arrangements and flowers. Flannery has a gift for making playlists. She has worked in the front of the house, in some finer dining restaurants, so she handles all of the final touches. We constantly challenge one another and ourselves. Another way we’re different is that we’re both hostesses. We’re there but we’re not sitting down for dinner, but you don’t necessarily feel like we’re not sitting down for dinner because we’ve already thought everything through. So, we’re there in everything you touch, see or experience.

What was your family’s reaction to you starting your own business?

Lauren: We have great families. Our parents are endlessly supportive. Our parents are also entrepreneurs. My dad owned his own company and Flannery’s mom owns her own company. They always told me I could do anything I want. They always ask the types of questions parents ask, like, “Are you making money? How are you going to grow?” They’re the types of questions that only drive you crazy when your parents ask them. There has never once been a moment when our parents said, “You shouldn’t do this.”

Flannery: It wasn’t like coming out of the closet to a conservative family. They said, “That’s great! You found something you love.” They actually benefit from it. They hire us. Some of our first jobs started through a family connection. One of our best clients came from my mom.

How has your initial vision of Big Little Get Together changed over time?

Lauren: We didn’t really know what the company was when we first started. We just wanted to cook and feed. We’re more business savvy now. The identity of the company is like a child. When it was first born, it didn’t really have a personality and now it definitely has it’s own character. It continues to grow, with us. Traveling has made a huge impact on the company. We’re inspired by companies that want to change the field they’re in. One of my biggest inspirations is a company called Avroko. They’re a design company that works primarily with restaurants. They do everything from branding to architecture to interior design. These are popular restaurants like EU, Public and Stanton Social. They’re a company of four people that came together each with different strengths and didn’t just want to be a graphic design company or just be an architectural firm. We approach business in a similar way. We can do anything. We can travel if we want. We’re not bound to a location.

Flannery:Because of the nature of what we do, we have endless possibilities to collaborate with other people, regardless of what their field is. Every job is a collaboration, and we can also work with outside artists. We can feature their art and food that is inspired by the job.

How do you guys promote Big Little Get Together?

Flannery: We’ve been all word of mouth. We’re very fortunate to have been approached with press opportunities, though it’s not something we’ve sought out or paid for. At some point, more press might be nice but you can’t beat word of mouth, especially in this city. It has been working really well for us.

Lauren: The biggest thing we pride ourselves on, is that over the past four and a half years, we have really created a community and also have immersed ourselves within the culinary community. We’re huge supporters of other chefs and restaurants. That gets you really far in this industry. It’s a really small community. If you start to put yourself out there and hang out with chefs, purveyors and wine distributors, the word starts to spread, especially if you’re nice and professional. We really strive to be positive members of the community.

What advice do you have for other entrepreneurs?

Lauren: Jump in. Don’t ask people their opinion. If we had known more about what we were getting into, I think it would have been a lot scarier and it was already pretty scary and stressful.

Flannery: If you’ve ever jumped off a diving board head first with your eyes closed, that’s kind of what it’s like. It’s a little exhilarating, it’s a little terrifying, but ultimately you know you’re going to survive. Then, it’s sink or swim. I would also say, love it or leave it. You have to really love it because the business is you. The brand is you.

What’s the future of Big Little Get Together?

Flannery: There is so much in the future. Cooking is definitely in our future. We’re pretty good at letting things happen naturally. It’s art and it’s creative, so we don’t rush the process. There’s definitely going to be a lot more writing. We’d like to do a lot more with video.

Lauren: In the long term, we would love to travel, we would love to have a cooking show, and we would love to write a book. We would love to become more of a brand and make something more concrete. Food is very temporary, so we want to make something more permanent.

If you were on death row, what would you choose as your final meal?

Flannery: It’s going to have to have a lot of components. I would definitely have wellfleet oysters and really great caviar to start. Then, I’d have some spanish gambas, little sweet clams and a plate of ibérico jamón. Then, I’d have an aged bone-in rib eye with a sunny-side up egg on top of it. And I’d skip dessert, unless Lauren made it for me. If she made dessert, it would probably be coffee ice cream. I would drink a lot of wine. I wouldn’t really need to drink liquor, but I might have to end it all with a shot of great tequila.

Lauren: I have a lot of courses too. I would start off with a poki salad from Tommy’s Sushi, in Tustin. I would have hard-shelled crabs from the Chesapeake Bay. Then, I would have gnocchi with truffle sauce from the restaurant where I worked in Tuscany. Then, I would have a burger from In-n-out. For desert, I would have pie that my grandma made. Her crust is amazing and anything she put in it, I would probably eat. Actually, I could probably just have crust. I would definitely have prosecco and a really fantastic margarita.

Special thanks to Flannery and Lauren. If you would like more information about the ladies and Big Little Get Together, please visit www.biglittlenyc.com

We first heard about Big Little Get Together from this video. It shows you first-hand what one of their themed dinners look like.

starting story posted Wednesday, March 24th, 2010