Vanessa Smith is the owner of Blue Ribbon Cooking, which was founded on her conviction that she was born and raised to throw parties for a living. Growing up in a cooking school, she developed a love for helping people celebrate life’s milestones. She launched into business ownership at the age of 23 and within three years was running a company with over 90 employees. Blue Ribbon now provides a vast variety of corporate team building cooking classes, custom catered events, all-inclusive weddings and kids summer camps. All activities are ingrained with a farm-to-table philosophy and the desire to bring folks back to the dining table. Blue Ribbon catering and food philosophy has lead them to win multiple “Best of” citations including four awards from leading national wedding site The Knot.
Lori Stutsman is the president of Extra Mile Marketing. She is an award-winning industry expert with more than 25 years of experience as a senior marketing executive. She has trained over 500 business owners, and consulted with over 3,000 businesses on their marketing strategy. Extra Mile is a leader in technology marketing and serves clients worldwide including: Microsoft, HPE, Dell, Avanade, and 2gno.me, among others. Stutsman’s leadership shows through her entrepreneurial drive, her passion for her client’s businesses, and her generous support of women and families. She has a degree in Communication Studies from UCSB, and is a graduate of the Batelle Leadership Institute.
The finalists all echo Nellie Cashman’s community spirit and philanthropy in various ways:
• Engberg has donated more than half a million cupcakes to local charities. Additionally, Pinkabella donates a portion of profits and all store tips to various charitable organizations, including programs that care for abandoned children.
• Hall has built her business around a culture of collaboration and trust, engaging employees in a shared vision, and with a commitment to give back to the community. The company annually donates over 40,000 cupcakes to help raise funds for local non-profits.
• Naramore volunteers and gives back through the support of organizations that focus on children, mentoring and empowering youth. In particular, she collaborates with Seattle Goodwill Industries to address education and job training needs in the region.
• Blue Ribbon donates $140,000 per year in gift certificates to various causes and charity auctions, provides scholarships for kids to participate in cooking classes and learn about culinary careers, and serves holiday and other meals to homeless youth.
• Stutsman backs a number of charities including Friends of Youth, the Seattle Humane Society, and Childhaven, while providing over 5,000 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for Seattle’s homeless community through Heroes for the Homeless.
WBO members and this year’s Nellie Award finalists are forging ahead, inspiring future generations of women entrepreneurs and business leaders just as Nellie Cashman did over a century ago. To paraphrase the question posed by Beyonce: “Who [should] run the world?” Clearly the answer at the Nellie Gala on October 5 will be: Women!
To attend the event or learn more about this year’s Nellie Award click here.
For more information about Nellie Cashman
For more information about WBO
Sources:
study by McKinsey & Company, Women as a Valuable Asset, April 2012
study by Zenger and Folkman, “Are Women Leaders Better than Men?” Harvard Business Review, March 15, 2012
hapter by Fisher, “The Natural Leadership Talents of Women”, in Coughlin, Wingard and Hollihan (eds.) Enlightened Power: How Women are Transforming the Practice of Leadership, Wiley: August 2013.