{"id":4249,"date":"2015-10-13T13:36:41","date_gmt":"2015-10-13T17:36:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/?p=4249"},"modified":"2024-02-14T10:38:10","modified_gmt":"2024-02-14T15:38:10","slug":"spotlight-on-kailey-gilchrist-of-nona-vegan-foods-a-saucy-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/blog\/spotlight-on-kailey-gilchrist-of-nona-vegan-foods-a-saucy-business\/","title":{"rendered":"Spotlight on Kailey Gilchrist of NONA Vegan Foods: A Saucy Business"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In honour of World Vegetarian Month, we thought we\u2019d feature one of our foodie entrepreneurs, NONA Vegan Foods<\/a>. Nona Vegan is a line of vegan and gluten-free cream sauces including Alfredo, cheese and carbonara styles that are sold across Ontario. Started by Kailey Gilchrist in Toronto, NONA\u2019s rich and creamy sauces can be used on noodles, veggies, protein, sandwiches, soup and as dips. The sauces suit the dietary restrictions that so many Canadians face, or even just people who are looking to make a healthier choice.<\/p>\n

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So where did NONA Vegan Foods get its start? Kailey spent countless hours in the kitchen with her mother cooking up a storm as a child. Unfortunatley, her mother passed away when she was 22 years old and she turned to cooking their favourite classic dishes for comfort. Kailey\u2019s friends and family enjoyed her food creations and encouraged her to start selling them. It took some coming around but Kailey eventually took that advice, and in June 2013 she officially started NONA Vegan Foods. It started with one retailer who was willing to carry her Alfredo sauce cooked by hand in a rented commercial kitchen basement. Since then, NONA has continued to grow its product line and the roster of Ontario retailers carrying its sauces\u2014even adding Whole Foods Market to its clientele.<\/p>\n

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Initially starting out, there were many hurdles that Kailey had to overcome as a \u201cfoodpreneur\u201d. One of those hurdles was the short shelf life of her product\u2014initially it would only last for 10 days refrigerated.\u00a0 The very short shelf life made business tough for NONA. This meant frequent cooks, small orders and numerous delivery days. Kailey did not want to put preservatives in her sauce like so many other brands would to solve the problem. Thankfully, a local program<\/a> at George Brown College helped her get the shelf life of her sauces up to three months without compromising quality or adding unwanted ingredients, which opened more doors for retailers to sell her products.<\/p>\n

Kailey\u2019s advice for entrepreneurs who are constantly learning and looking to improve their products\u2014ask somebody! \u201cPeople ask me how I gained so much knowledge about the industry and running a business when my background is in theatre, and the answer is\u2014I asked,\u201d Kailey explained. \u201cI cold-called other businesses and asked for 10 minutes of their time to ask them questions about the food business. Every single person said yes and I gleaned so much information from this.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The demand for NONA Vegan Foods continues to grow within Ontario, but NONA wasn\u2019t always known as NONA. Prior to NONA they were named Soul to Bowl Sauces\u2014a name that Kailey\u2019s and her mother came up with when she was just 14 years old. In 2014, Kailey received a letter from a company stating that Soul to Bowl Sauces was too similar to a trademarked name, and requested that she \u00a0stop all use of the name. After going back and forth with lawyers, finally Kailey decided it wasn\u2019t worth the headache, and let go of the name. . \u201cI believe the rebrand was ultimately for the best as it allowed me to re-start the branding with knowledge gained from my first year in business,\u201d Kailey shared. \u201cPeople were always tripping up the name, and they often called the company Soup to Bowl.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

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From this challenge with her branding came many lessons and Kailey shared some advice for other entrepreneurs to avoid getting themselves in a similar situation: \u201cPeople are very protective of names. I was to sentimentally attached to my first business name and should have done a more comprehensive job of filing initial paperwork. The business that had a similar name was also very attached to their name. Even though each business viewed the matter entirely differently, it ultimately came down to logistics for me\u2014they filed the trademark first.\u201d<\/p>\n

Being voted \u201cBest of Fest\u201d at the Mac and Cheese Festival in Toronto \u2013 one of several she has attended across Ontario \u2013 there is no doubt that Kailey will achieve her goal in growing her business, nationally. Kailey\u2019s final words of advice to entrepreneurs out there: \u201cHave a reason behind the business that is bigger than just money. Write it down. When you\u2019re having a challenging day and feel like giving up, read your \u2018why\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Written By:\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>Lauren Marinigh, Social Media & Content Creation Coordinator, Futurpreneur Canada<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In honour of World Vegetarian Month, we thought we\u2019d feature one of our foodie entrepreneurs, NONA Vegan Foods. Nona Vegan is a line of vegan and gluten-free cream sauces including Alfredo, cheese and carbonara styles that are sold across Ontario. Started by Kailey Gilchrist in Toronto, NONA\u2019s rich and creamy sauces can be used on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4250,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-futurpreneurs-and-partners"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4249\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futurpreneur.ca\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}