For Criselda Ventura, the road to selling her homemade steamed buns started with a craving.
Ventura is from the Visayas, a group of islands in the middle of the Philippines. She moved to Nova Scotia in 2012 to be with her partner and fell in love with the province.
But there was one problem—at the time, she couldn’t find any decent local steamed buns.
“There were frozen ones in the store, but they don’t satisfy my cravings. It’s the lack of flavours,” she says. “So, I decided to make it for myself.”
Over the next eight years, work took Ventura and her partner across Canada, first to Ontario and then to B.C. Wherever they settled, Ventura began sharing her steamed buns with new friends and co-workers. Soon enough, requests started coming in.
For years, this was a side hustle for Ventura. She worked full-time in a nursing home and made steamed buns for friends in her off hours, bringing a taste of her home country to her adopted one.
That changed when the COVID-19 pandemic hit Canada. After Ventura and her partner were laid off from their jobs, they decided it was time to leave the west coast.
“I wanted to be in Nova Scotia because even if I move to other provinces, I feel like Nova Scotia is home for me,” she says.
That was the first of several changes for Ventura. In the Philippines, she had owned a snack house. Now settled back in the HRM, she decided to revisit owning her own food business.
But in the middle of a global pandemic, doing so would involve navigating a changed food industry and a host of unfamiliar regulations.
“It’s really hard to open a business, especially for me as an immigrant. I had no knowledge about the rules and regulations,” she says. “I thought it was impossible to have my own food business here.”
‘IT WAS A REVEALING’
Ventura might not have known it, but many other women in Halifax and cities across Canada were in similar positions.
In the first two months of the pandemic, 1.5 million women lost their jobs. Others were forced to leave the labour market to care for out-of-school children or sick family members. Women from racialized communities and immigrant women were hit especially hard.
Out of work with bills to pay, some women started making and selling food online. Unlicensed food businesses are not a new phenomenon, but COVID-19 revealed how common they had become.
“When the pandemic started, it was a revealing,” says Natalie Frederick-Wilson, a business advisor at the Centre for Women in Business in Halifax. A Halifax transplant by way of New York, she has been with the Centre for four years.
“A lot of people doing this are doing it because they have no choice,” she adds. “They’re doing it because they’re shut out of traditional opportunities.”
When she heard about a woman whose unlicensed food business was shut down by health inspectors in 2020, she began thinking about solutions.
After more than two years of planning, the result is the Specialized Program in Cooking Entrepreneurship (SPICE). The program was piloted in February thanks to support from the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) and the Nova Scotia Department of Agriculture. It helps under-represented women who want to start a food business access vital knowledge and resources.
The free program helps participants register and license their food businesses and gives financial support for necessities like liability insurance. It sponsors 20 hours in a commercial kitchen and funds things like travel costs, marketing supplies and raw goods.
It also connects participants with experts in the food service industry. Women in the program can consult with lawyers, food scientists, lenders, and established chefs. It’s a chance to learn about the industry and find mentorship.
The program is open to all women, but there is a specific emphasis on BIPOC and immigrant women.
“We started thinking about how food is such an economic development tool for women,” says Frederick-Wilson. “Why wouldn’t we find a way to educate underrepresented women to help them to stop operating illegally and educate them in the foundational roles of operating legally?”
BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS
SPICE aims to combat inequality in the food service industry, levelling the playing field for women entrepreneurs. It’s a first-of-its-kind program in Nova Scotia—and one with the potential to change lives.
“The resource of access goes over and over to male chefs,” says Frederick-Wilson. “They get the financing; they get the access to partnerships.”
“Economic advancement should be for everyone, and this program provides an in for those who would otherwise be locked out,” she adds.
Cassandra Downey is one of the women who took part in the SPICE pilot program. The 34-year-old Dartmouth resident started cooking when she was 12, making meals for her seven siblings. More than two decades later, it has become a passion.
“I love cooking. It just represents me in so many ways. Because how vibrant and different and unique I am—I use that in my food,” Downey says.
Despite her love of cooking, she didn’t consider making it a career until recently. After serving time in jail last year, she decided it was time to make a change.
She completed a degree in culinary management at Nova Scotia Community College and took part in the Blk Women in Excellence program last year. After hearing about the SPICE program, she decided to enrol.
Speaking the day after completing the program, Downey says it was transformative.
“It actually saved me a lot,” she says, adding, “I’m leaving the program with a lot of competence, and a lot of wisdom.”
Learning how to plan a menu, portion food, and brand her business were among the topics that Downey says will help her move forward.
More than that, the program introduced her to other women entrepreneurs. She says this was a learning experience of its own.
“You learn from other people, even if we’re not doing the same thing,” she says. “We’re learning from other people’s experiences and other people’s businesses.”
‘MAYBE THAT’S MY DESTINY’
After a successful launch, the CWB hopes to continue growing SPICE including plans to make changes to better support each new cohort and attract new funders to support the program.
The CWB wants to see more resources come to Halifax to support women food entrepreneurs. Frederick-Wilson points to Venture Food programs in Ontario and New York—accessible programs supporting food startups that are not currently available in Atlantic Canada.
Lastly, she points to the need for community kitchens. The closest kitchen hub to Halifax is currently in Windsor—an hour-long trip by car.
“My dream is that we have a… space for food makers where they can legally produce food in a safe sanitary place where they have the support of business services like myself,” says Frederick-Wilson.
In the meantime, graduates of the first cohort are considering their futures in Canada’s food industry. Downey says she is currently looking for funding for her catering business, which specializes in soul food.
Ventura also recently completed the program. With help from the Centre and the YWCA, she was able to license her business. Her food stand, Pinoys Best, now sells steamed buns at the Halifax Seaport Market.
“I can’t believe how people… have accepted my products,” she says. “It’s amazing.”
What once seemed impossible has now become a popular option in the market. On her first day there, she sold out. Now, she says it’s not uncommon for people to wait up to 20 minutes for her steamed buns.
“Maybe that’s my destiny,” she says.
In the future, she hopes to bring her pork, chicken, and vegetarian steamed buns—and her homemade chili garlic oil— to stores across the province.
She recommends that women interested in owning a food business take part in SPICE, no matter how impossible it seems.
“Go out, make a connection, because you don’t know. Those connections might lead you to a great opportunity,” she says.
To learn more about the SPICE program, visit centreforwomeninbusiness.ca/learning/spice-specialized-program-in-cooking-entrepreneurship.
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