ABOUT KHADIJA WALLACE:
Khadija is a mother of five who is a specialist in the business of culinary artistry. She is the Founder and CEO of Joyful Treats Catering and the Founder and President of Joyful Treats Community Development Corporation. Through her love of food and community, she has expanded her impact by going from a caterer to a nonprofit leader in the Washtenaw County community.
RESOURCES:
Joyful Treats Community Development
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TRANSCRIPTION:
David Fair: This is 89 one WEMU's Washtenaw United. And today, we're going to offer up a special bit of hospitality. I'm David Fair, and there are any number of young people looking to successfully enter the workforce as a caterer or food industry entrepreneur and build a career and life in the hospitality industry. Now, it can be a hard road to travel, and that's why the Ypsilanti-based Joyful Treats Community Development Corporation created a foundational program called Celebrations. Not only is it a training program, it's a community builder. Our guest this morning is Khadija Wallace, and she is corporate caterer and a founder and executive director of Joyful Treats. And thank you so much for making time today, Khadija! I appreciate it!
Khadija Wallace: Thank you for the invitation! And I would like to thank United Way also for allowing us to be one of their partners!
David Fair: I want to quote you on the mission of Joyful Treats. You say it is to provide BIPOC leaders of tomorrow a trailblazing platform for financial freedom. How does the Celebrations Hospitality program serve that mission?
Khadija Wallace: We serve that mission by way of educating future industry inquirers how to start their own business. So, not only are they securing a future for themselves financially with ownership, they're also becoming educated on how they can engage with different cultures in the community over food. So, that is the basis of Celebrations--it's an educational piece. It's also service learning because they'll be able to kind of shadow our programming and learn the different ways that they can serve food.
David Fair: Now, this Celebrations program serves those aged 15 to 25. And that's really a pretty wide age range, given the different education and maturity levels contained in there. Are different age groups trained differently, or does everyone kind of start on the same page?
Khadija Wallace: It's kind of a start on the same page scenario. We're looking for people that are really passionate about learning with the world of hospitality. So, the program itself is actually a vision for the kids that may not want to go to college. Therefore, they have an alternative education, so that they can learn more about the food sector.
David Fair: So, whether they're 15 or whether they're 25, what is the process for teaching how to build a prosperous career outside of college and lift members of the BIPOC community in the Celebrations program?
Khadija Wallace: So, we educate them, again, on the engagement matters of how they would service a person. And being friendly and a people person is probably the only prerequisite, because you have to like people to be able to serve. But we have an eight-week program where they'll come in and they'll learn the proper ways of filing their paperwork for the business and different things that will come up, the difference between indoor catering and outdoor catering. Now, what's really popular is food trucks, so we have a lot of people that want to learn how to own their own food truck. The industry is growing big time. So, those are the things that we're teaching them as they get older. I want to go more into like an upscale scenario with the hospitality and the travel. We try to look at different galas and things that more of the political leaders would use, so that they can learn how to engage in a corporate sector as well. So, not only do they have the mom-and-pop neighborhood gatherings that they're educated on, they're also educated on a higher level if they want to travel the globe and be able to engage in different countries. So, that's kind of like the overall programing of how it operates. So, we have our first program, which is the lecture series that teaches them the basic paperwork of the business itself. And as they continue throughout the program, we have other segments that will teach them on a global platform.
David Fair: I certainly don't need to tell you, Khadija, how difficult the food and hospitality industry is to succeed. And there is a high rate of failure even among those who become successful. So, how do you incorporate that message that failure is and can be a part of success?
Khadija Wallace: My personal experiences have been that my failures--I've taken and learned from them. So, I try and teach that to the younger generation that's coming along, so that they'll have options when they're faced with the same decision. That might have been a failure for me, because just because it didn't work for me doesn't necessarily mean it might not work for the next person. So, we take those failure moments, and we look at different opportunities to educate with them. And that has been one of my biggest success is being able to take those failure moments and learn from them and execute a new plan. And always being humble is my secret also, because when you're humble, you're open to hear other things that you may or may not want to hear, and you learn from that. So, that's been my most successful strategy--it's staying humble and trying to keep an open mind, so that you can look at different ways of engaging in the failure pieces.
David Fair: You know what? That sounds like wisdom to be passed on, not just in the world of business, but I'm going to just venture a guess and say this is also a message that you impart to your children and now your grandchildren.
Khadija Wallace: Yes, I do! All the time!
David Fair: This is 89 one WEMU, and our Washtenaw United conversation with Khadija Wallace continues. Khadija is founder and executive director of Joyful Treats Community Development Corporation. To discuss challenges a little bit further, I want to look closer at what you face at Joyful Treats. Like most everyone in the food and hospitality industry, staffing and consistency have become far more difficult since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. How is that playing out for you right now?
Khadija Wallace: Administrative support is our number one challenge as well, but we just be creative and try and figure out ways of getting volunteers, because that's the beauty of our charity. It's because we're a nonprofit, we can always ask for volunteers versus on the other side, if you're a profit entity, most people are looking for you to pay them. They look for that with the nonprofit also. But when you're doing charity work, people have more of a heart to help give, and a lot of the community members want to give back and feel like they are part of the community is by working with a charity and being able to give back. So, of course, the administrative support is our number one challenge. We do have ongoing volunteers for our biweekly food pantry that we do here, and a lot of times we can get volunteers for, like, we do a holiday distribution where we're passing out toys for families that can't afford a holiday season. And back to school is another big distribution where we're able to secure our volunteers that we need. However, on the educational piece, our signature piece, which is Celebrations, we don't have the ongoing volunteers. So, that has been a pilot program where it's more of a one-on-one type deal with myself. And some of the board members would engage with people that's interested in the program. So, we're still piloting Celebrations right now, and we're looking for funding opportunities, so that we can have the full cohort of people to come. And that way we can run the full program the way it's intended. But, again, our number one challenge also is administrative support. But we have been blessed to be able to secure it as we need. Right now, we're gearing up for back to school. So, we have six interns currently over the summer in our office, and that has been a great help because we're getting ready for our fall season, which is one of our busiest seasons. Like, as we kick off September, we'll have our back to school event. Then we're having a fundraiser in October because we want to do some capital updates in our facility and just have some money for basic operational things and trying to develop a fee fund for our administrative support that we're looking at securing. So, these are some of the things that we're trying to do to to jump ahead of that challenge that might be coming with the fall season being our busiest season.
David Fair: And I would imagine that the silver lining is that those who participate in your workforce development programs, including Celebrations, get to see those struggles and those challenges up close and personal and see how the experience of dealing with those challenges can benefit you in the long run.
Khadija Wallace: Yes, because I always ask people that come on site that want to help and move us forward. What is the one thing that you would like from us? Because it's not just about us taking from people because they're giving their time, which is very valuable to me. So, I ask, "What is the one piece that we can assist you with, so that you can gain something as well?" And, oftentimes, I make sure that we're executing that win-win for everyone. And I have a wonderful board that supports a lot of the visions that come along. So, when people come in and they share their stories, it's just such a rewarding feeling to be able to assist them with those things, because I have to accept that I'm getting up in age now, so I feel a little something where I'm able to share those life wins and those valley moments, and it's just a rewarding thing to be able to say, "Oh, I went through that!" and be able to direct them on a path, so that they don't have to go through the struggle as severe as I may have went through it, or that they have other options where they can think through it before they make their decision. So, we appreciate all of the time that's given to us from our local community members. And, like I said, we always look to engage them and look at what their needs are as well, because it's all about listening to what their needs are, so that we can be a better resource for them.
David Fair: Once again, we're talking with the founder and executive director of Joyful Treats Community Development Corporation, Khadija Wallace, on 89 one WEMU's Washtenaw United. And, Khadija, I want to talk to you about another challenge, and that is customer service and personal engagement. Just about everyone can give you a recent example of poor customer service, whether it's encountering a rude worker or someone who appears disengaged or uninterested in their job. How do you at Joyful Treats emphasize that component into your workforce training and community work?
Khadija Wallace: Well, if you know me, you know I'm a people person, and I love to talk. That's just the Alabama in me. But I don't let people come around me and not talk or not engage. Like, if you're going to be around me or in my space, we're going to be joyful and smile and we're going to talk. So, oftentimes, with that kind of attitude, when people come here having a bad day, we figure out what's bothering them, or even if they don't want to share it if it's too personal, we figure out a way where we can really log on to them and engage with them and get them to open up, so that they don't feel that way. Because when you're in this business, you have to be a people person. It's just not going to work if you're not. And it makes it so much easier when you're able to get along with people to be able to share those experiences and stuff. So, customer service is a must. It could make your career or it could cause its failure. And that was one of the things that I learned very early on in life from my family is that your attitude could make you or break you. So, I've always learned to try and make sure my attitude is appropriate as I show up to different opportunities.
David Fair: And to take that a step further, social media has taught us how to communicate almost exclusively in a remote kind of way. It's probably made us more distant from one another than bringing as close together as intended. You have been known to say, "Teamwork makes the dream work." So, how do you overcome the barriers that social media and that sense of nonpersonal communication plays into how you deal with young people?
Khadija Wallace: Well, now that we've gotten through COVID, I try and have more insight and on-site personal events here to kind of get people out more, because I believe that we really need to get out and enjoy the air and what we have that we take for granted every day. So, I try to really engage people more personally versus the social media or find different games that we can do on social media where it will engage people or have them to say, "Okay. I went there today and I followed Joyful Treats there or what they did. Let's see what they got going on for tomorrow." So, that's something that will draw them in to keep them engaged. Those are some of the strategies that we're looking at, as we go into the 25 year, is how we can get more people actively engaging on social media, because a lot of people still don't want to come out and be around people. But we're looking for those emotional pools where we can say, "Oh, we can get them to engage through this." Like, we have an upcoming fundraiser in October. So, what we're doing is we're looking at ways of once we have our fundraiser, how we can keep those people engaged, and we have some exciting things that we're planning. So, I would like to invite everyone to support us. We're having a Bridgington masquerade ball October 26th. And if they don't mind supporting us, that would be a great help because it would help us get some of the updates done on our facility. And, also, it would help us to be able to secure some staffing, so that we can enlarge our impact, because, at this point, we have been limiting some of our services because the lack of staffing and volunteers are there. So, we're trying to compact that with this fundraiser in October. So, we're asking the community to support us on our efforts there, so that we can continue the greatness that we've been told we've been doing. And we want to be able to enlarge our impact throughout Washtenaw County.
David Fair: I know you mentioned that the Celebrations program itself is in the pilot stage, but I anticipate that you and I are going to have conversations in the future and share all the stories of success. Thank you so much for taking the time and talking with us today and sharing the story of Joyful Treats!
Khadija Wallace: Thank you so much! It's been a great pleasure! And, again, I thank you guys for giving us this opportunity! And we want to thank United Way for the support that they've been greatly giving to us as well!
David Fair: That is Khadija Wallace. She is the corporate caterer, and she is founder and executive director of Joyful Treats Community Development Corporation and our guest on Washtenaw United. For more information on Joyful Treats and its Celebrations program, check out our website at wemu.org. Washtenaw United is presented with support from the United Way for Southeastern Michigan. And you hear it every Monday. I'm David Fair, and this is your community NPR station, 89 one WEMU FM Ypsilanti.
UWSEM STATEMENT:
This year, Joyful Treats Community Development received a $10,000 award from the 2025 cycle of United Way for Southeastern Michigan’s Power of the Purse Fund—an investment that supports existing and emerging agency programs and initiatives that increase the financial capability of people who identify as women.
This funding was used for Joyful Treats’ Hospitality Workforce program, Celebrations.
The majority of individuals who complete Joyful Treats’ culinary workforce development program are women of color with children seeking to start their own food-based businesses. Funding will ensure this program continues.
Every year, United Way hosts the Power of the Purse event, which showcases the work of grantees and generates funds for future grantees.
WEMU has partnered with the United Way for Southeastern Michigan to explore the people, organizations, and institutions creating opportunity and equity in our area. And, as part of this ongoing series, you’ll also hear from the people benefiting and growing from the investments being made in the areas of our community where there are gaps in available services. It is a community voice. It is 'Washtenaw United.'
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