Your Network is Your Net Worth w/ Chris Grdovic

In this conversation, Lauren Alvarez interviews Chris Grdovic, Chief Partnerships Officer at Goldbelly. They discuss Chris's career journey, including her time at Food and Wine and her experience on the very first season of reality TV show, Top Chef. They also talk about the importance of collaboration, trust, and caring in building successful teams. Chris shares her insights on creating a fun and approachable environment in the food industry and highlights the significance of assuming the best in others, and they dive deep on her experiences working in the publishing industry, her transition to consulting, and why she chose to go back to full-time. Chris and Lauren emphasize the importance of building and maintaining a strong network, as well as the value of planning and setting goals. Tune in for some favorite eats, some highly recommended reads, and why assuming the best in others fosters positive and productive teams. 

"Respecting the parameters of the person you're reaching out to, acknowledging their professional pursuit, and then asking for the favor, man, that's going to get you so much further." - Chris Grdovic

Follow Don’t Fuck This Up on IG: @dontfckthisup.podcast
Follow Lauren Alvarez on IG: @LaurentheAlvarez

Follow Chris on IG: @grdovic

Recommended books in this episode include:
 'Setting the Table' by Danny Meyer
'Unreasonable Hospitality' by Will Gadara
‘Your Network Is Your Net Worth’ by Porter Gale
'Fast Forward' by Lisa McCarthy

Email the show at advice@dontfckthisup.com for your questions to be answered on an upcoming episode!

Transcript

Lauren Alvarez (00:01)
Hello, I am here with Chris Grdovic Chief Partnerships Officer at Goldbelly. Chris, welcome to Don't Fuck This Up.

christina grdovic (00:09)
Thank you, Lauren. I'm really, really happy to be here.

Lauren Alvarez (00:12)
I'm so happy to have you. And I feel like we had a little bit of back and forth on scheduling, which honestly just gave us, I think, both time to get really excited for this particular recording. So I just am so grateful that you're here with me today.

christina grdovic (00:24)
Yeah, I think I was telling you that thinking about being on your podcast was such a gift. Thinking about going back and thinking about all the different jobs I've had, the cool ones, the not so cool ones, was a really, really nice journey for me.

Lauren Alvarez (00:41)
Well, I mean, that's always such a great thing to be able to reflect and I definitely want to be able to get into some, you know, early days in your career and kind of what brought you to where you are today.

I mean, I introduced you with, you know, where you are today, but let's talk about, I mean, early days. I'd be remiss not to mention you've worked with some of the best chefs in the entire world. In your days at Food and Wine, you were really kind of spreading your wings in terms of transforming the publishing space. So.

I mean, really, I'm curious to start with, like, what was your initial attraction? Have you always been interested in, I'll say, Food & Wine, as in the things that you intake, not the publication?

christina grdovic (01:17)
Right, I do not have that story of, you know, I grew up cooking with my grandmother and all these amazing meals. Food was absolutely not part of my...

I mean, like everyone, you know, I ate meals and I enjoyed food, but it wasn't, it just was not a big part of my, a part of my life. I had a bunch of sort of adjacent food jobs, you know, through high school and college, which, you know, now are sort of funny because I did learn a bunch of things. I didn't know it was ultimately going to be things I did. My first, my first real job when I was in high school, I worked in a bakery.

Lauren Alvarez (01:49)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (01:55)
which was a really, really, really great experience. I also, I sold beer and ice cream at Shea Stadium, which is, you know, what Citi Field was before it was Citi Field, which was incredibly hard work, like hard physical work, but was also very, very rewarding, extremely fun.

Lauren Alvarez (02:06)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (02:18)
I managed a Haagen -Dazs in Grand Central Station, which is extremely random. And ultimately, what got me into food was I was working at an advertising agency at the time. It was called Kerschenbaum & Bond. It went on to be KBMP and then something else. And it was such a great agency, probably most well known for the work they did with Snapple. And I started there because I had been

is a funny turn in my career. I had a very, very good friend that was working at Kirshenbaum and Bond. And at the time, I had recently gone through a breakup. And they were doing this program called Generation VS. And it was for their Hennessy client. And they were taking people and sending them out to bars to make a scene and order Hennessy martinis, which is kind of a weird drink because it's cognac and it's a martini.

Lauren Alvarez (03:14)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (03:15)
And it was taking people who didn't know each other and sending them to these bars and making a scene to order the drink. And it was, you know, it was guerrilla marketing at its best. And so I did that for a while and it was so wonderful that she gave me that opportunity because I needed something like fun and interesting to do. And then at the end of that project.

the woman who was organizing it at the agency was leaving. And so I interviewed for the job and I'll never forget my friend Felicia's father was like, absolutely not. You cannot work together. It will never work. And I was like, okay, Mr. Stingoni, you can just mind your own business. And luckily she hired me and we had so much fun and worked with such a great group of people.

Lauren Alvarez (03:49)
Thanks for your support, yeah.

christina grdovic (04:01)
and ultimately took this Generation VS thing all over the country. We went to San Francisco, LA, Chicago, Miami. And the reason that got me into food is because at the time we were going to all of the best bars and restaurants and bars and restaurants were becoming sort of a cool place to hang out. Not unlike, you know, everyone had been going to nightclubs, not that people didn't still go to nightclubs, but restaurant bars were becoming, you know, this is the early 90s.

Lauren Alvarez (04:22)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (04:30)
And so people were starting to pay attention to chefs. It's before the Food Network. And so I did that for a few years, which was, I mean, I don't know if there's a better job for someone in their mid twenties where your job is literally to go out and find the best bars and restaurants, buy your friends drinks, and then hire people that you think are the best ambassadors for.

for this. I mean, they were basically influencers before they were influencers. And then because I had all those experiences, one of the things I did with a wine client that we were working with was I went to the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen and...

Lauren Alvarez (05:02)
That's amazing.

christina grdovic (05:16)
another friend of a friend who I had met through the business then said somebody they were looking for somebody to produce that event and so I ultimately left Kirshenbaum Bond to go to Food & Wine

Lauren Alvarez (05:27)
I mean, mean, such an incredible trajectory because it is like an accidental, you know, it's like you kind of fell into something really exciting that probably just like you said, you went through a breakup, you were looking for a change of pace, you got into this, you know, gig then you're like, wait, I think I could do this full time. I mean, I also, you know, cut my teeth in the advertising space. I think it's a really, you know, I kind of go back and forth. Like I think the agency space is a really challenging environment to work in. I also think early career, there's almost nowhere better to get your experience because you're working across.

so many different projects, such a fast pace. And when folks come to me early in their career for coaching and they're asking, how do I get the experience? I want this big tech job. I'm like, you should go to an agency and just, you know, one year there is equivalent to like probably four years at a client side company because you're just working across so much. I mean, what was one of the most memorable clients that you worked with? Was it that Food and Wine Festival in Aspen? Was it, you know, what were you experiencing that you loved?

christina grdovic (06:11)
Mm -hmm.

So when I was at when I was at Kirshenbaum Bond, I was first hired to work on specifically Hennessy and we did those crazy drink programs. But then that led to other at the time it was it was owned. It was called Shelfland and Somerset, which was the distribution, you know, the distribution company. And so we worked on the other LVMH brands and we worked on Grand Marnier and Moet and Chandon. And that was such an incredible experience.

Lauren Alvarez (06:29)
Right.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (06:51)
It's not only for what you're talking about, because when you're at the agency, you get to see all the different client relationships. You see what everybody else is doing. You see what the media people are doing, the creative people, the account people. And it was an incredible education. But then I also got to learn.

about wine and cognac and cocktails. And, you know, this is in the go -go 90s, right? So if you worked on Hennessy, you literally went to cognac and in France. And like, those were such incredible opportunities and experiences. I also worked on.

Lauren Alvarez (07:09)
Mm -hmm.

christina grdovic (07:26)
Rioja, which is a wine region in Spain, unfortunately didn't get to go to Rioja. But again, got to learn a lot about wine, which I knew nothing about at the time. One of my closest friends, he was taking his journalism career and moving it into specifically wine. And ultimately, that was also how I met my husband, because he and I were each other's plus ones everywhere we would go.

Lauren Alvarez (07:39)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (07:55)
go. And then that and then I met my husband who coincide maybe not so coincidentally is a publicist mostly for restaurants and chefs for lots of other things, travel clients and products. But at the time it was very restaurant chef heavy. So all of a sudden my my my professional life completely melded with my personal life, which which I like. I like it that way.

Lauren Alvarez (08:23)
Yeah. And I think it's important, you know, you bring up something that's, I think, more than any other time in my career, but I think for a lot of people, you know, during the pandemic in recent years, we sort of didn't have a choice but to meld our professional and personal lives. You know, we were opening our laptops and starting our work days at our homes and...

closing our laptops and maybe getting a smooch during lunch. I mean, that would be the best case scenario. That was my scenario. But I think that it's also interesting because it's important to have those boundaries. It's important to kind of have those parameters. So what were some of the things that you did for yourself and maybe even as advice to a listener who does have a job that really coincides with their personal life? Like, how do you recharge the batteries? How do you give yourself kind of off the clock time, so to speak?

christina grdovic (08:46)
Right.

So I don't know if I do or if I did because I liked it so much. I think if you're working in a field that isn't also sort of your hobby, right? I mean, food is a hobby. But I loved learning more about food and learning how to cook and learning more about wine. And those were all things that were...

Lauren Alvarez (09:23)
Mm -hmm.

christina grdovic (09:35)
part of my personal life because I also love entertaining. My husband and I, my husband's a really, really, really talented cook. So we're always having people over everywhere we go, you know, small parties, large parties. And so I don't know if I ever really felt like I needed to take a step back from that because I feel like anything I was doing, if I was like reading things or watching things or, you know, or going to talks, if they were about food,

Lauren Alvarez (09:55)
Mmm.

christina grdovic (10:05)
or wine that was enriching both parts of my life.

Lauren Alvarez (10:10)
a prior guest, Bill Conway, who, you know, started the Hard Times, which is a large online, you know, editorial platform, he said, you know, if you do what you love, you really do never work a day in your life. And he's like, I know it's, it's been said a lot of times, but it always stuck with me because it's true. It's like, if you can create that, you know, space and it's the thing that you love, then it doesn't feel as strenuous like you're working. It doesn't feel as...

christina grdovic (10:18)
Right.

Lauren Alvarez (10:33)
arduous, like you're actually investing in enriching your own experiences. And so I think that's great. And maybe the word of encouragement or advice here is just try to put yourself into an environment where you're in an industry that you actually care about. And I think that, to me, is like, I've worked for companies and clients that I'm just like, yeah, I don't know. Money is green or something. And it just never is fulfilling to me. It's always going to be the best case scenario is that I really fuck with what we're doing.

christina grdovic (10:47)
Yeah.

Right. I am.

Yeah, I mean, and not to suggest, like, I certainly, you know, I definitely believe in balance, right? I love to work out. I love a long walk. I love to travel. I love vacations. But like, even travel is a great example of, you know, you're on vacation. It's 100 % of vacation, right? You've actually, like, you have your out of office message. You're not taking any meetings. But when I'm on vacation, I still...

it's all about the restaurants, it's all about the food, it's all about the market. Recently we went to Barcelona and I had to make sure that I went to every single food market. And it doesn't necessarily mean like going to the best restaurants or the Michelin starred restaurants. It just means finding really, really interesting things that are delicious. And I almost never have a meal that isn't purposeful in some way, shape or form.

So my point being, even though that's vacation, it's still giving me more like research for work.

Lauren Alvarez (12:03)
Yeah.

Yeah. Is it a tax write -off? Yeah. I mean, yeah. What do you think? I mean, I think that's amazing too, because you also spoke to something that I think really resonates with me. My dad was a chef by no means like the fanciest of chefs, but I think I grew up eating and experiencing food differently than a lot of people, because it was like, his guidance was always like, just try it. And if you don't like it, just politely spit it in your napkin. And...

christina grdovic (12:14)
Yeah, that's a good question. Yeah, I don't know. Diane, what? Yeah.

Lauren Alvarez (12:37)
try to feed it to the dog, you know? And it's like, I think that that's a great approach to have when you're out experiencing new things. And even if it's not food, it could be an experience. You could say, yeah, not my favorite, moving on. But I think that also, you know, kind of taking away the eliteness around food. You know, I mean, you've worked with some of the top restaurants and chefs in the world. And also taking away, you know, that thing that feels stuck up or that thing that feels unattainable. I mean,

wine, I think, is something that you've seen more in recent years, you know, have fried chicken and a glass of champagne because it's more fun, right? Or natural wine and really making it playful instead of such a serious, you know, what is the minerality and, you know, where are we coming from? And I think that there is something really refreshing about that space that feels less stodgy and much more approachable.

christina grdovic (13:09)
Yep.

Right.

Lauren Alvarez (13:25)
So I know you had a really big hand and, you know, especially during your time at Food and Wine and then at Travel and Leisure, but really thinking about this, you know, what were some of the kind of initial strategies that you thought, okay, I'm having fun. How do we make this more fun like what I'm having?

christina grdovic (13:39)
Yeah, it's funny, like exactly what you just described is what this woman who hired me, who's another really good friend of mine, my friend Pam Norwood, when she hired me at Food and Wine, her mission was to go in. She went in and she was like, wait a second, they're playing classical music and they're wearing double -breasted blazers. Like, why are they making food? And the people that were there loved food and were such, they had so much expertise, but it wasn't fun. And so the mission was, okay, how do we

Lauren Alvarez (13:58)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (14:09)
we make this more accessible because obviously if we make it more accessible then we can have a bigger audience. If we have a bigger audience, we sell more advertising, right? Which is ultimately the goal at the end of the day. But how fun is it that...

Lauren Alvarez (14:18)
That's the goal.

christina grdovic (14:22)
the way you're gonna get there is by making it more fun. And so that was more parties and loosening everything up and exactly what you're describing, if it's champagne and fried chicken or like, I remember like we hired Questlove like long before he was Questlove to DJ a party, which like, people weren't doing those kinds of things. So it was a lot about making it more accessible and more just, yeah, more fun.

Lauren Alvarez (14:30)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah.

I love that. I mean, I feel like it's a good moment to ask, like, who do you have a favorite restaurant that you feel like does that really right? Because I do think also people are curious and then there's the intimidation. I think Instagram's done a good job of breaking down barriers, showing us what goes on. You know, we have shows like The Bear that shows us what actually happens in those high -end kitchens. But what restaurant or, you know, maybe even a pop -up are you thinking when I mentioned that, like, make it fun, make it approachable, like, what stands out to you?

christina grdovic (15:07)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah, I mean, it's so, so hard for me to...

Lauren Alvarez (15:20)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (15:21)
to pick out individual restaurants because I don't get to be a regular as much as I would like, you know, because I'm always trying to try what's like, what's new, what's next, what's happening. But for me personally, I prefer a more casual environment. Like I, of course I've enjoyed so many amazing tasting menus and, you know, fancy restaurants, but my preference is more like a, in New York City, like a via

Lauren Alvarez (15:28)
yeah.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (15:51)
Corotta is like my perfect setting, right? I love Via Corotta. I'm trying to think like, if I think about the last few meals I had, there's a new restaurant near my apartment in Brooklyn called Gertrude's, which is just fantastic. It's a small menu. Everything's good. The drinks are good. The wine, you know, it's a small wine list. And like, that's what I like. I like, it's sort of like, you know, I like a boutique better than a department store.

Lauren Alvarez (16:14)
Yeah.

thousand percent.

christina grdovic (16:19)
And I mean, I could, my other favorite, I also ate there this week is Chouquette, which is Middle Eastern. And you know, you just get, it's so delicious, but it's so casual and you're just sharing everything and things keep coming and going. And that's sort of the vibe that I like very much.

Lauren Alvarez (16:25)
yeah, so good.

Yeah.

Yeah, I agree. I mean, I think like that I've definitely had exposure to the pomp and circumstance and you feel like you're in your best behavior. In which order do I use my utensils in and everything? And like there is a really fun experience that comes with that because it's like, wow, I mean, I certainly didn't grow up with that type of exposure. And so when I first got to experience those things, it was really exciting to me. But I so much more respect like the fun, the energy, the kind of vibrancy that comes with like, let's make this family style. Let's all pick off each other's plates. Like, I want a little bit of that and a little bit of this. And.

you know, we'll order the menu. You know, that's the best if you have like a four top and you get some good friends with some good adventurous spirit and you just say, yeah, we'll have everything with the small menu, just however you want to course it out. I mean, so thinking about like when you were, you know, moving into the space of also being in leadership, I want to talk about your time, you know, at Food and Wine, moving into overseeing teams, you know, overseeing people and growing them in their career. Because you, you know, as you said, sort of happy accident in the best way possible, you know,

christina grdovic (17:18)
Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Lauren Alvarez (17:39)
created this amazing trajectory for yourself. How did you leverage your own experiences to bring people up, you know, that were like, how'd you do it, Chris? I wanna be like you. And you're like, well, how do you do that?

christina grdovic (17:49)
Yeah,

So when I started at Food and Wine, my initial job was to be the event marketing manager on the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen. So my job was to produce this one event, which was obviously a huge event, but I wasn't working on all these other marketing initiatives or there was a team of salespeople. And the way it had been structured was everyone was very siloed. And so when we got there, this again, my friend Pam, we got there, we were like, why? Like, why are

are you doing it this way? Everybody should be working together. And again, it'll be more fun for everybody. It'll be more efficient. And so we started doing that. And I'll never forget at the time, our CEO, I got hired for this job. And our CEO said to me, this is a three -year job. People can only do it for three years. They get burned out.

And I remember thinking, why? Like, why? And at the time, I hadn't had a job for more than three years, so that seemed fine. But I was like, what are they burned out about? Aspen, the chefs, the wines? Like, I'm not following what part of this they get burned out by. And so obviously, I stayed for 20 years, so I didn't get burned out after the three years. It also happened to be like a moment in time that chefs were becoming, you know, chefs were becoming, not that there hadn't been celebrity chefs before that, but there were,

Lauren Alvarez (18:58)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (19:15)
were on TV more, there were more, they were just part of the zeitgeist. So that made it really fun. And I think ultimately what happened was, hold on, the question was, collaboration is the answer to the question, right? Collaboration and everybody just like sharing all their information and everyone on the team making everyone else better. And

Lauren Alvarez (19:20)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (19:43)
you know, I.

I think, you know, some people don't necessarily agree with this, but I do think you have to hire people that you like, you know, they don't need to be your friends. You don't need to hang out with them on the weekends, but you spend a lot of time together. And especially the way we were working at the time, we were, you know, we were all in the office. I know that doesn't really happen anymore, but we were in the office for very, very long hours. And then we were traveling a lot and we would go to these Food & Wine festivals and we'd be away for like entire weekends together. And so, you know,

if you're going to be stuck in an airport with somebody for nine hours, it's going to be a lot better if you don't dislike them.

Lauren Alvarez (20:23)
100%. And I think you said something when we were talking about some of the things you wanted to chat about in our conversation today. You mentioned something. You said, happy people are more effective, I think was exactly what you said. And it's so simplified, but it's so true. I think when you feel happy, and I also can relate. I remember, yes, when we used to go in the office five days a week, sometimes six days a week. And we were grinding, and we were working till late, and we'd all order dinner. But there is a certain joy of we're all like,

christina grdovic (20:45)
Yeah.

Lauren Alvarez (20:52)
one team, one goal kind of mentality. And, you know, I think it does kind of put you in the position when you're a leader to really kind of be like the team coach as well and really help people to see highlighting their, you know, their strong suits, putting them with other people that can help them, you know, get better in the areas of improvement. So it's like you are kind of looking at everyone and you are coaching them, you are participating, you're super hands on in those environments, right? You're not just like sitting at a desk and telling everyone what to do.

christina grdovic (21:20)
Yeah, I think what you said about like putting people in the right spot and then having other people help them is really so, so important. And it was oftentimes like moving people around on different projects and sometimes identifying, you know, if there was...

I was going to say a weak link, but it's less about a weak link and maybe the person, like the troublemaker, right? Like who's the troublemaker? And like, let's either move the troublemaker somewhere else or figure out what the problem is and solve that problem because then it's better for everybody, right? And when I think back, obviously I'm not going to name any names, but like I think about a couple of different people who...

Lauren Alvarez (21:43)
Mmm.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (22:01)
sometimes, you know, and I was gonna, now I was gonna say the squeaky wheel, but I think that, cause I'm definitely a squeaky wheel and I think it's okay to be a squeaky wheel. The troublemaker is not so good. So it.

Lauren Alvarez (22:08)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (22:13)
I'm trying to think of how to explain it, but if you saw somebody that was like making somebody else unhappy, like as the leader, as the manager, it is your job to get in there and figure out a way to make everybody work well together. Because if they're not, then the work's not getting done. And so, yeah, I think coaching, it's very much like, not that I've ever coached a sports team, but it feels very much like, right, that's it.

Lauren Alvarez (22:29)
Yeah.

Totally.

But you could, yeah.

christina grdovic (22:43)
how teams work, right? Because it's all about, I mean, for lack of a better term, it's about the teamwork, right? It's not about the individual, it's about the team. So I think the other word I used was, it's an ensemble, right? Which I think if you have a good team, that's what it should be. It should be an ensemble. There shouldn't be the one person who's always either coming up with all the ideas or getting all the credit or is sort of the most forward -facing. Ideally, it should be like,

Lauren Alvarez (22:50)
thousand percent.

Yes, yeah, totally.

christina grdovic (23:13)
you know, the cast of Friends and everybody's, everybody's famous.

Lauren Alvarez (23:14)
Yeah. I mean, it's so interesting, you know, you say that. And as you were talking, it made me think about, you know, I had this really amazing team. Probably one of my prouder career moments was during my time at Airbnb, you know, we went through like massive changes. I mean, we did a big layoff when everyone stopped traveling early in the pandemic. That was pretty, pretty chilling, right? And like from a talent HR recruiting standpoint, 80 % of my team went away overnight. And it's like, I inherited this new team.

christina grdovic (23:33)
Yeah, yeah.

Oof.

Lauren Alvarez (23:43)
everyone gets on the Zoom call, everyone looks like a rescue puppy. They're like, what the fuck do we do? And it's like, I don't know. I don't know what we're going to do. And that's vulnerability as a leader, right? But what ended up happening with that team is we rebuilt. And that team of six people became a team of like,

22 people at its biggest, you know, and it was like the thing I was most proud of was that it wasn't about me as the leader. Like, yes, I was always available to like block and tackle. Like I dare someone to try to come for my team. Like I will I will completely, you know, roll you. But also allowing them to do their best work and just trusting in them and saying like, it's not up to me. Like you tell me what you what you're best at. But then having a lean enough team. And I think this is an issue I see with a lot of people that I work with now that have over hired and they're at a point where they're like,

christina grdovic (24:12)
Yeah.

Lauren Alvarez (24:29)
hey, we have so many people. And I'm like, yeah, but nobody feels empowered to really push the work, right? Because they're all thinking there's other people who are going to do it. So having a lean enough team where there's accountability and they all trust each other. And so you can't be a weak link because everyone can see that. They see that it stands out. They see this person isn't pulling their weight. And they're like, no, we're not pulling their weight. We're just pulling their weight.

The way that this team was and what made me so proud is that they all held each other accountable. So it wasn't about me. I could be out for a week on vacation and come back and things were better than I left them. It's because they truly cared and no one was gonna let that work fall. And I think that's the thing that like when you're building massive events, when you're growing a team, when you're scouting new talent to join your organization or your team specifically, it's like you have to figure out like...

who's gonna come in and push and also be open to being like that, pure ship is something we talk about on the show a lot.

christina grdovic (25:22)
Yeah, I think there's a couple of words that you said that I think are really, really key. The first one is trust, which I don't know. That might be the most important of everything, because if people don't trust each other on so many different levels, the whole thing falls apart. Even the most basic thing, I remember we used to talk a lot about assume the best, because you like,

Lauren Alvarez (25:35)
Yeah.

Yes.

christina grdovic (25:50)
I mean, this is sort of dating myself, but like when BlackBerry's came out, right? And all of a sudden people were emailing from home and people got cell phones and they were taking calls from different places. And maybe everybody wasn't physically in the office at the same time. And obviously everybody was always traveling in different places, but we reminded each other to assume the best, which meant like, just assume that everyone else is working as hard as you are or as smart as you are. And don't like get caught up in...

this person took this day off and this person was over there, right? And that's part of the trust, but the trust goes so, so much deeper. And then I think it's attached to the other word you used, which is care, right? And so do the people, do they care about each other? Do they care about the work? Are they proud, right? Like I think...

One of the things that I'm most proud of from my Food & Wine days and the teams are how many of the people have left and gone on to work with each other and hired each other for different things, right? Like there's one, our old creative director has his own creative studio now and lots of other people have hired him to work where they are. There's another guy who was our digital director who started his own entire digital sales company.

Lauren Alvarez (26:57)
I love that.

christina grdovic (27:14)
I don't even know how many people are there now. There's probably seven. There's another woman somewhere else who's hired a couple of people. And I love all these subgroups. And none of that could have, would have happened without the caring and without the trust.

Lauren Alvarez (27:22)
Yeah.

Well, I think that's so interesting too, in that during that time you had the opportunity to also grow your own career. I mean, we'll talk about kind of branching on your own and going into the consulting space, but I mean, you had some pretty big milestones during that time. I mean, I would be remiss not to make you talk about your time on reality TV on Top Chef. So we're going to talk about it. What was that like? How did that come about?

christina grdovic (27:52)
Yeah, it's such a great story, especially because here it is 20 years later and it's still on the air and it's still winning awards and they're still evolving and innovating. What happened was, I can never remember what year it was, but I guess it's like,

Lauren Alvarez (27:59)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (28:09)
I don't know, 2006 maybe. And we're getting tons of proposals for all these different reality style things, because you have to remember at the time, like survivors on the air and like maybe a season of Project Runway. But like there's no real like there's no real reality TV and nobody thinks it's going to last. Right. Everyone thinks it's a trend and it's just here for however long it's going to be here. And so we had gotten all these proposals. They weren't great. And then one day we got introduced.

Lauren Alvarez (28:21)
Right.

Totally.

christina grdovic (28:39)
again, a mutual friend of a friend, introduced me to somebody at Bravo, and we had a meeting, and every time they would say something, we would be like, my God, like, you know, they'd be like, we're about talent scouting, and we were like, we're about talent scouting, we're about discovery. And so we had all these shared, like, values, and it just felt really, really good. But I will say, when they first called and said, you know, we're gonna do this TV show, and we're gonna vote a chef off every week,

You know, we all sort of rolled our eyes and was like that sounds silly but we looked at the proposal we had a zillion meetings and and then we we agreed that we would do it and You know, I can say this now, but honestly I thought like what's the worst thing that could happen if it doesn't work It goes away. No one's gonna remember it right? No one's gonna be like, you know Food & Wine they did that silly TV show and so Part of the deal was the winner gets featured in Food & Wine

Lauren Alvarez (29:30)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (29:39)
they get to come to the Food and Wine Magazine Classic in Aspen. And then the other thing was who...

we have the opportunity to put a judge on the show. And at the time, our editor in chief had young children. She couldn't like go live in San Francisco for a month. And so they said, send as many people as you can for the screen test, because the more people you send, the more likely we'll find somebody. So we sent a bunch of editors. And then the night before, we were like, let's send Gail. Gail Simmons had gone to cooking school, was in the marketing department, which is not typically the people that get to go on TV.

right? But she had worked for Daniel Balloud, she had worked at Vogue for Jeffrey Steingarten, so she had a lot of culinary chops and we sent her and they loved her.

and they picked her. And so Gail became a judge. She and I flew to film the pilot. I mean, I didn't film, right? She was filming the pilot. I did the deal. And when we got there, they gave us like a clipboard that had all the chefs. I don't know if they called them chef testants at the time, but like the bios of the chefs that were going to be competing. And Gail and I are looking through it and we're like,

we don't know any of these people, like, is this gonna work? And...

Lauren Alvarez (30:53)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (30:55)
And a lot of the reason we did it, I mean, we trusted Bravo, Tom Clicchio was involved. And so the chef Tom Clicchio, we were like, okay, Tom is smart. Tom's not gonna do something that's not right.

Lauren Alvarez (31:06)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (31:07)
But it all worked out and it was great. And I mean, a big part of the reason we did it at Food and Wine was because you're always trying to attract a younger audience, attract a different audience again to make the audience bigger so you can sell more advertising. And so that was a wild, wild success for us in so, so many ways.

Lauren Alvarez (31:28)
It's incredible too, I mean, just to have that exposure and to be able to be on the ground floor of something. I worked with the hospitality collective when I was living in Boston and one of the chefs from our restaurant group actually went on to win, I think it was like season 10, Kristin Kish. I mean, she's like a big fucking deal now. I know, yeah, so she won and then now she's the host. She's so great.

christina grdovic (31:45)
She's the host now. She's, and she's also the best. She's the absolute, she's the absolute best. She's smart, she's beautiful. She actually, she said this thing, I'm trying to, I don't wanna paraphrase it because I don't think I'll do a good job, but she was on a panel that I went to last year and she was just like incredibly articulate. I adore her.

Lauren Alvarez (32:10)
Yeah. She's incredibly thoughtful. She's a great mentor. It was always impressive to see her because she's one of those people who moves in silence and kind of like stealth mode. And then you're just like, wait, my god, you just did all of that. But she was always taking the younger up and comers under her wing. And that was something that I got to observe. And then you see someone go on TV and you're like, no, she seems cool, but I know she's actually cool. And that was always really interesting to me just to see that. Yeah.

christina grdovic (32:22)
Yeah.

Yeah, and I have to say, like, going in, you know, we were skeptical in the beginning. We weren't sure. Obviously, there were, again, we thought reality TV was not a real thing. But Bravo did an amazing job. The producers, the magical elves were, are just really, really good. They cast incredible chefs and so much talent has come out of that show and they've done a really, really good job. So, yeah, that's one of...

Lauren Alvarez (32:46)
Yeah.

yes.

christina grdovic (33:05)
Yeah, it's one of my favorite things.

Lauren Alvarez (33:06)
I love that. I mean, and the other thing I was curious about is you mentioned Chef's Club, and that was something that you were collaborating with the same Regis and Aspen. And this was something that kind of extended that the Food and Wine Classic beyond kind of the confines of that one event, right? This was a year long, you know, event that you kind of curated.

christina grdovic (33:23)
Yeah, it was great. What happened was, so the Food Moin Classic is obviously, not obviously, but it is in Aspen. And having hosted it for so many years there, we had very, very good relationships with all the hotels, the town, et cetera. And so the people who were managing the St. Regis at the time came to us and said, they had had some celebrity chef restaurants in the hotel, but they wanted to do something different. They wanted to,

Lauren Alvarez (33:29)
Yes.

down.

christina grdovic (33:53)
They wanted to show people that they could do something interesting. And so we actually sat down and we brainstormed. It started out as a top chef idea, but the top chef idea didn't actually work as well for the hotel. And then we came up with this idea of, I mean, Chef's Club, ultimately, naming something is one of the hardest things you will ever do. So at the time it didn't have a name, but we came up with this idea that we would have rotating guest chefs. And like, how great is that, that a restaurant can be.

reinvent itself. However, you know, if it was once a quarter, twice a year, and as a guest, you would be able to...

Lauren Alvarez (34:27)
Hmm.

christina grdovic (34:31)
like experience all these different things. We did it in Aspen. It was great. And then we opened a second one in New York City with the intention, the owner of the St. Regis wanted this to become global and we were going to open them all over the place. The one in New York was, I think was pretty successful for a while. And then they decided to go in a different direction and not open more. And now the old chef's club is Terese, which it's such a, I mean, it was a beautiful restaurant when it was chef's club.

and now Terese has made it, I don't even know if they've made it more beautiful, it's just a beautiful restaurant. So yeah, when I first went into Terese, I thought, am I gonna have, like, am I gonna be sad? Am I gonna miss Chef's Club? But Terese, it was so great that I sort of, you know, I was able to do both things. I was able to miss it, but then also love the new restaurant.

Lauren Alvarez (35:07)
Ugh, I love that.

Yeah.

Well, I really love that. I mean, so I want to talk about moving into consulting and that space. But one thing that you said that really stuck with me is your friend wrote a book called Your Network is Your Net Worth. And the reason I'm bringing it up now is because one, I think that's a fucking great title. And two, it really is like such a great.

christina grdovic (35:34)
It really is, right? Porter Gale, it's a call out to my friend Porter Gale. She's like the most amazing, like reinvents herself, always is a star. And I actually had her come and speak at one of our sales meetings when that book came out.

Lauren Alvarez (35:51)
which is so powerful. And I think the obvious question would be, my gosh, you had so much success in the publishing space. Why would you ever go out on your own? But as someone who's done exactly that, I also know that there's something really special. But I think more importantly is that theme of your network and your net worth and how that can build your confidence. So when did you know it was time to go out on your own?

christina grdovic (36:16)
It was time for me because publishing was changing so, so much. And initially,

Food and Wine and Travel and Leisure and Departures were owned by American Express and then American Express was no longer allowed to run a publishing company so they had to sell it. They sold it to Time Inc which at the time we were managed by Time Inc so we knew all the players and you know it seemed like such a natural transition but the whole advertising game was changing and it was becoming more about you know what Google and Facebook were doing so it was a little bit less about

Lauren Alvarez (36:40)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (36:55)
the brand and more about the numbers. And it just, it was a, it was, I had, I had had so much success and I had, it had been such a dream job that it felt okay to, you know, to, to take a step, take a step away. And so I didn't totally know what I was going to do. But what was so wonderful was that clients,

Lauren Alvarez (36:58)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (37:19)
called, like ex -client, you know, my ex -clients called and said, you know, what are you doing now? And one was he had been the president of Belvedere and we had done an enormous amount of work with Belvedere. But he was now the new US president of Fever Tree and Fever Tree was launching. I mean, they had been in the US, but they needed to make a big splash and have better distribution. And so he called and was like, hey, you know, will you help us with this? And so that was really exciting and

Lauren Alvarez (37:30)
Hmm.

christina grdovic (37:49)
really fun. And, you know, even now, you know, now I've been gone for, I think, seven, seven and a half years. Just a couple of weeks ago, I was connecting with Kerry Gold was one of our biggest advertisers at at Food and Wine, and I connected with the old Kerry Gold client. And I have to say, like, I'm still I'm still connected with a lot of those people. And some of those relationships are like some of like, I value those more than more than anything. So.

So yes, your net worth can be your network, not for everybody, right? But I guess, definitely never wanna burn a bridge and you wanna keep those relationships alive, which I think, one of the things.

Lauren Alvarez (38:19)
Yeah.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (38:37)
I can't remember when I sort of identified this, but I think sometimes when you have a full -time job, not consulting, right? Consulting is a full -time job, but like one company, you're so focused on that job that you're only talking to people that can help you move forward in that role. And when I left...

Lauren Alvarez (38:46)
Yes.

Mm -hmm.

christina grdovic (39:00)
I sort of remembered, you got to keep in touch with everybody, right? Like you have to have those like random coffees and phone calls and emails because you just never know. And so that has been really, really, really important for me over the last, since I left Food & Wine. Because I think when I was at Food & Wine, I was like head down and I was only like, I basically was like only talking to people that were related to that part of my life. And so.

Lauren Alvarez (39:28)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (39:30)
That's one little piece of advice I would give people, which is like.

Lauren Alvarez (39:33)
I love that. Yeah, I mean, just keeping those connections alive and, you know, nothing is more transactional to me and it's off putting when someone just reaches out to me if they need a reference or someone's just reaching out to me if they need advice or they need career coaching or something versus someone who just like wants to keep the connection alive. And then I'm 10 times more likely to want to help you, you know, hype you, remember your name when I'm in a room and someone's saying, I really need somebody who does this. Like,

There was a rolling list of people in my brain at all times of like looking for an opportunity. they'd be great for this. And people ask me all the time, do you know somebody who does this? And sometimes I'm just like, no, you know, there's no skin in the game for me, except for I just want to help this person. But it's like the people who stay top of mind are not necessarily the ones who have worked closest with me. They're the ones who stay in touch just because they genuinely liked working together.

And that to me always goes so much further. And I try to reciprocate the same of like, you know, to your point, it's not just about the people who can help me or serve me or whatever you want to put it. It's also who, you know, you never know, like who knows who and what connections they have and how it might lead to something in the future.

christina grdovic (40:38)
Yep. Yeah, I 1000 % agree with all of that. And what I would add to it is,

I can't remember who I was having this conversation with recently. Like I'm always, I'm happy to, I feel like I do a lot of favors. I ask a lot of favors. I feel like I'm happy to do that all the time, right? Cause that's how you get things done. What I don't love is the people who reach out and don't tell you why they're reaching out. And I find myself in this situation more and more often where I literally am like, are they, are they reaching out to me because they think there are job opportunities at Wonder?

Lauren Alvarez (40:55)
Sure.

Yeah.

Ugh.

christina grdovic (41:16)
or are they reaching out to me because they think I can introduce them to somebody or are they just reaching out to your point because they're trying to stay in touch and all of those things are fine, right? I'm exactly, I'm like, just tell me what we're, what, correct. And I...

Lauren Alvarez (41:26)
but just be upfront.

In the first line, in the first line, like nothing's worse. I totally, my gosh, like you just sent something through my body. It's like when I get the text, it's like, hi, how are you? And I'm like, is this a trap? You know, it's like, I don't know. And it's also like with text and email, like we're so accessible to each other. It's like, I might be like in the middle of a bunch of things. And if someone texted me, hi, how are you? I don't really want to think more about it than like exactly what you're asking of me. You don't actually care how I'm doing. You need something for me. So just, just ask me for it.

christina grdovic (41:55)
Yeah, and somebody just did it the other day, this woman that I worked with so, so, so many years ago, and I probably haven't talked to her in like three years, and she reached out and said, you know, I've been thinking about you, I'd love to get together, and I want to let you know, you know, I'm back in the job search, and this is what I'm looking for, and I was like, yes, 100%. Happy to see you. Exactly.

Lauren Alvarez (42:03)
Yeah.

love that. That's exactly how to do it. That's perfect. And you're so right, though. And it's like, I mean, I encounter this a lot as a coach. People are like, asking me a question. It's just like, hey, do you know, you know, do you know anybody, anybody who works here? And it's like,

are you asking what the vibe of the company is? Are you asking it for an intro, right? But it's like, and then it's like, are you asking for me to do work for free? Because I'm also pretty sensitive to that. Like, I'll always like throw down for people and make an intro. But it's like, at some point, you have to also remember this is what I do for my living. This is this is actually what I do. And so I think it's also a reminder that like respecting kind of the parameters of the person you're reaching out to, acknowledging their professional, you know, that this is their professional pursuit, and then asking for the favor, man, that's going to get you so much further.

christina grdovic (42:35)
Right.

Yeah, agreed, agreed.

Lauren Alvarez (43:03)
Yeah. I mean, talk to me about like where you've, because I mean, going from being client side to having your own thing, when do you feel like you've had the most growth in your life? And what really caused that for you? Like, when have you grown? Was it those moments where you were in your early days working in the team? Or was it when you went out on your own and you were sort of like in the wilderness somewhere in between maybe?

christina grdovic (43:24)
So when I went out on my own, I didn't really, I didn't know if it was.

If it was forever, if it was for a finite period of time, was I going to hire people and turn it into a business? And I did it for, I guess, about, I don't know, two years. And it was great. I loved all the clients I worked with. Things continued to find their way to me, which was great. I didn't get to that place where you're looking over your shoulder wondering where your next client's coming from. And I started my role at

Lauren Alvarez (43:37)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (44:04)
Wonder as a consultant. So I had gotten introduced to them. It was long before the launch. It was a stealth business. And they wanted somebody to help identify.

the most popular cuisines, the best restaurants, the best chefs, and then make the introductions and then ultimately negotiate the contracts. And so I did that for six months. And at the time, I had a handful of clients and everything was great. And at the end of the six months, they asked me to come on full time. And so that was a pivotal moment, right? Because I was like, OK, I'm definitely much more of a...

Lauren Alvarez (44:38)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (44:43)
like corporate one job, not consulting type. But.

I was enjoying it, so I was like, okay, what do I do? What do I do? And the reason I took it was a couple of things. One, all the chefs that I had recruited to come to Wonder loved the idea. Everyone was really enthusiastic about it. And I thought, okay, well, if these chefs who are all smart and successful think it's a good idea, then I think it's a good idea too. And the people I was working with at the time, I mean, some of them are still there, some of them are not.

were really, really smart and also really outside of my circle because I had spent so many years in advertising, in publishing, in food that I had this circle of people that everybody was two degrees. Everybody knew everybody. If you didn't know them, you knew somebody who knew them. And so these people were completely different people. And I loved that. I loved.

Lauren Alvarez (45:24)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (45:46)
that I was jumping into an entirely new world. They worked differently. And so that's why I took it. And then the timing could not have been better for me personally, because it was right before the pandemic hit. And I think had I been consulting during the pandemic, obviously it would have been a very, very different thing. And then it was also.

Lauren Alvarez (46:02)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (46:11)
pretty exciting to be able to launch a business during the pandemic, which is what we did.

Lauren Alvarez (46:15)
Yeah.

Yeah, and let's talk a little bit about Wonder too, because I think that Wonder is such an interesting concept around having like, you know, everything is like health tech, you know, fintech, but food tech and like, what does that actually mean in the food tech space, but having a startup, you know, as it pertains to food. I mean, we've seen things like Cloud Kitchen, stuff like that kind of bubble up and maybe bubble down.

But I'd love to hear what was attractive to you about this. I mean, you spoke about the chefs being passionate about it. It's a discerning group of people that were like, this is a really good idea. What are you seeing now that we're like, I'll say like moving, we've moved through the pandemic, we're on that kind of the other side of it. What have been some of like the exciting points about working at a company like this?

christina grdovic (47:00)
So I would say it is definitely a food company, but it is also very, very much a tech company. I often describe it as food tech. And that is exciting. And it's exciting to be there because I do believe that we are making major innovations and major changes, right? The business started out as we were delivering food to people's homes in these mobile

Lauren Alvarez (47:04)
Yeah.

Yeah.

christina grdovic (47:30)
kitchens that were, you know, outfitted with, there were trucks that had outfitted kitchens inside of them. And we were, we were, we started in New Jersey and we were going to neighborhoods where, you know, maybe there were a few restaurants, but there wasn't, there wasn't a huge amount of assortment and there wasn't like what you can have in New York City. And so we wanted to bring people more food, better food, faster, hotter, all of that, which we did. And it was great. Turns out the trucks, you couldn't really deliver as many meals as you want.

to because people really want to eat in a very

like, you know, 65 minutes. And so because we had done so, so, so much work on the R &D, the research and development of how to optimize food for delivery, we were able to pivot and go from the trucks to the to brick and mortars. And so now there are these brick and mortar stores in in New York City, in New Jersey. I think there's 12 now. They'll be 35 by the end of the year, 90 by the end of next year. They're going to be everywhere. And.

Lauren Alvarez (48:05)
Yeah.

No big deal.

christina grdovic (48:31)
So the tech is very, very exciting, but for me, the most exciting part is the food is really, really good. Obviously, I couldn't do what I do if I didn't believe that the food was great, right? I can't go to chefs and try to convince them to come on this platform if the food isn't great. And so there are two wonders, actually, I live between two of the wonders. And I...

Lauren Alvarez (48:38)
I love that.

christina grdovic (48:55)
Like even though I get to eat the food at work all the time, I often will order it for myself or go pick it up because it's that good. And the team of chefs that we have, not only the chefs that we work with, you know, the Jose Andres, Marcus Samuelson, Michael Simons, the chefs that work at Wonder are incredible. Like they're very, very talented, really smart and come from all different places, right? Four -star restaurants, hotels, catering companies, but they're just, they're very, really, really smart.

really good. So for me, that's the biggest part. The best part, I should say, not the biggest part.

Lauren Alvarez (49:29)
That's amazing too. And I think like, well, I mean, yeah, it's what's the biggest part to you. What's the biggest draw for you, right? And I think, the thing I think about is like the accessibility of good food is such a, it's so neighborhood to neighborhood even sometimes. I mean, I remember when I first moved to New York, I lived pretty deep into Bed -Stuy, like off the Utica stop and there was seregina. That was like...

christina grdovic (49:50)
Yep, I love saragina. Yep.

Lauren Alvarez (49:50)
Amazing, amazing, you know, walkable. I used to keep an envelope of cash actually, because they were cash only when I first moved in. I had an envelope of cash at my apartment that I would have just for pizza, pizza, pizza cash. But it was like, that was the big restaurant, but there was still not a lot of access to like great food. And then we think about affordability, you know, in the US of like,

christina grdovic (49:56)
Haha!

Lauren Alvarez (50:11)
that good food feels like a privilege. And I think that we've got a ways to go. But then, as someone who you've also traveled to Europe, you've spent time understanding that there is different levels of quality that you can experience around the world. What are some of the things that you feel like stand out to you when you think about food and access here in the United States?

christina grdovic (50:25)
Right.

Things that stand out, I mean, I think, gosh, I think the access we have is sort of unbelievable, right? Living in New York, living in Brooklyn, I feel like I can get whatever I want whenever I want. And...

Lauren Alvarez (50:54)
I do miss that.

christina grdovic (50:55)
Yeah, and I, for me, when we said, okay, we're going to start opening these stores in New York City, there was a little part of me that was concerned because I thought, well, we already have everything, like, we don't need anything else. But, you know, I think...

Lauren Alvarez (51:09)
Right.

christina grdovic (51:13)
not just New Yorkers, but New Yorkers for sure, always want what's new, what's new, what's new. And so at Wonder, we're always introducing new restaurants, new dishes. And even though I have a zillion restaurants in my little tiny neighborhood, there are certain things that I want from Wonder because I think we do it better than anybody else. Like I have a couple of go -to salads, a couple of go -to sandwiches. There's a salad on the Jose Andres menu.

Lauren Alvarez (51:19)
Yes.

christina grdovic (51:43)
that sometimes I can make it myself, but other times I just want to get it delivered and have a plate of jamon with it. And so I think the answer to your question is, the answer is actually, sorry, I know what the answer is. It's not just assortment. It's so many different global cuisines now, right? Where it used to be sort of the, obviously it will always be the obvious ones, the pizza, burgers, Italian, Mexican, but now there's so much great,

you know, Thai, Vietnamese, Korean, and I think we're just going to go further and further like, you know, like there's, you know, Filipino is really, really popular. And I think that's great for everybody because I think it, you know, it educates people, it teaches them, plus it gives you more access to not only great food, but like learning about other cultures.

Lauren Alvarez (52:21)
Mm -hmm.

Absolutely. It's been one thing that I really love. I mean, living in LA, we have such a good food scene here. And I was really stressed about not having what we had in New York. I mean, 3 AM, Ethiopian craving hits, and boom, it's there in 20 minutes.

christina grdovic (52:44)
Right.

Lauren Alvarez (52:45)
But I think one thing about LA is that you really do see a lot of the Latin culture influence for sure. The Mexican food is just better here. I mean, there's no, I think, won't even, I won't even have that argument. But I do think, I do think that there's also something to be said about, you know, the Asian influence and just the culture. Filipino food has been popping here for a long time, you know? And I think that that's actually like a really cool thing to see. But there's so much pride in kind of neighborhood to neighborhood, which I do think parallels with New York. You know, like LA and New York will always talk about like why we're so different.

christina grdovic (52:53)
Yep, yep.

Yep.

Lauren Alvarez (53:15)
from each other, but as a like long time New Yorker who is now in LA, I'm like, this is very much the vibe is like you're within your neighborhood, you really believe in the places, but will you travel outside of it to get the best thing? Absolutely.

christina grdovic (53:28)
Right, yeah, that's so true. I think this one restaurateur who just opened a restaurant in Brooklyn, Gabe Stulman, was saying he wanted to open a Brooklyn restaurant that people from Manhattan would go to and not say they're going to Brooklyn. I mean, I think there's tons of great restaurants in Brooklyn, but I understand that behavior that people feel like, I don't know if they feel like it's a track, right? But.

Lauren Alvarez (53:55)
Yeah. I mean, I was a really naughty New Yorker. I had a car, so I was going everywhere. I was the worst. I was like, go jump in the car in Brooklyn, drive up to the Upper East Side, because I need a certain pastry, and then I'll head home. And yeah, just, yeah, I mean, food tourism within your own city. I mean, talk to me about, like, what are some of your favorite brands right now? Who's doing business right? Who do you, who are you excited about? Like, I know Wonder is doing some really cool stuff, but.

christina grdovic (54:08)
I love that. I love that.

Lauren Alvarez (54:22)
Outside of that, it doesn't have to be in the food or wine world, but what stands out to you?

christina grdovic (54:26)
God, that's a great, that's a really, really good question. You, I know, hold on, I have to think about this for a second. You mentioned that you were at Airbnb and I think what Airbnb is doing right now with their experiences is really, really interesting because they sort of, I mean, lots of people don't even know that Airbnb offers all these experiences, not just if you are staying in an Airbnb, but if you need.

you know, like I took a bicycle tour around New York City, which was a different story. I don't necessarily recommend that. But but but it was really it was it there's just a lot of interesting things. And then they I think they're calling it icons. And there's a whole new like really, really high end interesting stuff like I don't necessarily need to stay in the house that was in the movie up.

but I think it's really cool that you can. So I think they're doing a really, really good job.

Lauren Alvarez (55:17)
Yeah. Yeah.

christina grdovic (55:26)
This is, I mean, I guess this isn't, people don't really think of it as a brand, but I think the New York Times does a great job. I, you know, as a former print, you know, obsessive and, you know, would get on an airplane with like 16 magazines and I don't really read magazines anymore, I like the way the New York Times interacts with me, right? Like I'm happy to.

read it digitally. I'm happy to read the hard copy. I think the newsletters they send are really smart. I think just it's such an old brand that feels very, very modern, which I think is really, really hard to do.

Lauren Alvarez (56:10)
Yeah, I love that. I love their, I play their chronological put these events in order game and I'm so good at it. I was like, damn, I should have maybe been in the wrong career. I don't know. Yeah. It's like, yeah. And we play all the games at night like this, the word games and stuff. I think it's fun. I like also like to interact with it in that way because it doesn't feel so serious. You open the app to play a game and you might catch a little news, but you don't have to like only go there for that purpose, which I also think is clever.

christina grdovic (56:17)
that's funny. That's so funny.

Right.

Lauren Alvarez (56:36)
Yeah, and the Airbnb experiences, I don't know if you ever did any of the food related ones, but they have some very cool ones. I mean, when I was there, we were launching these and it was like, go to Italy and learn to make pasta with an Italian grandma and all of that. So, so fun.

christina grdovic (56:49)
Yeah, I love that. I love that. The other one, okay, this is, I don't know a whole lot about this brand, but this is sort of gonna tie a few things together. One of the founding partners of Kirshenbaum Bond, Bill Oberlander, has an agency called Oberland, and they just did an ad campaign for Elf, the makeup brand, ELF. Have you seen this?

Lauren Alvarez (57:06)
Mm -hmm.

Yeah. Is it the one with Judge Judy?

christina grdovic (57:16)
No, it's one that is about, I want to get the words right, but I'm pretty sure it's too many dicks.

And it's because they, his agency is all about like doing good for growth, right? Not just, and so it's identifying that there are, I'm not going to get these, the data exactly right here, but you're going to get the gist of it, which is there are more CEOs named Richard and Dick than there are female CEOs altogether or something like that. and so the brand is bringing the, bringing this,

Lauren Alvarez (57:23)
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

my god.

christina grdovic (57:52)
to the forefront to, you know, get its attention to hopefully like bring more diversity to the C -suite.

Lauren Alvarez (58:01)
That's amazing. I mean, and something that I think is a really big fish to fry. And I think that everyone wants to talk about diversity and, well, not everyone. A lot of people don't want to talk about it. They want to talk about diversity and belonging and how to be inclusive. And then you look at our leadership teams and you think about it from the top down. And I mean, especially yourself as a woman coming up in a very male -dominated industry. I mean, in food and hospitality and wine, I mean, those are very male -dominated industries, or they were. And there is a bit of a sea change, even publishing, yeah.

christina grdovic (58:10)
Mm -hmm. Right.

Well, and even publishing, even though there were so, so many women there, the people at the top, you know, the people at the top were mostly men. I mean, there were definitely women in the boardroom, but it was definitely a lot more men.

Lauren Alvarez (58:33)
Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's like we can only hope that we continue to see that evolution. I mean, knowing that we only have a couple more minutes together, I'd love to know, are there any books or learnings that have really shaped you in terms of your career or your vantage point or any favorite podcast you've listened to lately that have made you excited that you'd like to share out with our listeners?

christina grdovic (58:57)
Mm -hmm.

So, okay, there's a book that I haven't read yet that, now I can't remember the name of it, but I'm gonna find it.

Lauren Alvarez (59:07)
Okay.

christina grdovic (59:08)
A woman who was a salesperson at Food and Wine, my good friend Debbie George, her sister started a company called Fast Forward. And I was lucky enough to be in the beta class when she was, this is many, many years ago. She's wildly successful now. But I got to be in the beta class of her Fast Forward training program. And like she does all the sales training now for Facebook globally. And.

The two things that I took away from that that I use all, all, all the time are one is plan the work, work the plan.

which anybody that worked with me at Food and Wine is going to be like, my God, here she goes again. But work the plan, plan the work, work the plan was for everything you were doing, right? For even like the most basic sales call you were going on. Like, did you do all the research? Did you think it through? And now you did the work and like take it to the next level, right? So we used it at the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen all the time because everybody was going there for the weekend. And sure, you knew you were going to have great food, great wine. You were going to have fun.

It was beautiful there. But what were you doing? What clients were you seeing? How were you moving any business forward? And so we would say, OK, so now before you get there, plan the work. And then when you're there, work that plan. So that was one thing, which I love, because I think it's incredibly useful in so many ways. And then the other one is,

Lauren Alvarez (1:00:33)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (1:00:43)
Again, I can't remember exactly how it was articulated, but so this woman's name is Lisa McCarthy and she has a new book out that I've meant to buy and I haven't read it yet because I think it's going to be great because here I am, you know, like 15 years later talking about things that she taught me, which was you create your, you create your goal plan, right? Everyone always talks about, you know, you, you, you write down your goals for work, but do you write down your work goals for your personal life? So when you do this, this project with her, it really makes you think about like, where do you want to be in five years?

in your personal life, but the way you write the goals is you write it as if it's a year from now, right? So it's one year from now and you want to write what you've accomplished and it's just a different framework and it's really, really smart and really effective and so that's what I would say is the answer.

Lauren Alvarez (1:01:14)
Hmm.

I love that. And I think also just knowing that, you know, when you just put another, I think every person that you've mentioned on this call, not on purpose, has been like a really powerful, amazing woman who's also pushed you or shaped you. So just like, that's really what makes me really happy is to know that like there's other women pushing other women to like keep rising. And like, I think that we have to do that and say each other's names, but like you've just.

christina grdovic (1:01:59)
for sure.

Lauren Alvarez (1:02:00)
You've just given like a, you know, like a roll call of like some very cool, very prominent women that like folks that are listening should be Googling and listening to and reading. And Lisa's book, Fast Forward, you know, we can also link in the show notes too, which would be really good. How can we kind of follow your work? What are you working on next? Where can people learn more about you, Chris?

christina grdovic (1:02:02)
Right.

So I post a lot of what I eat on Instagram. It's just my last name, GRD, O -V -I -C.

Lauren Alvarez (1:02:29)
Love that.

christina grdovic (1:02:34)
So within the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen, American Express does a trade program specifically for the restaurant trade. And so my panel is Danny Meyer, Marcus Samuelson, Katie Kindred,

and Nikki Fetterman, Nikki Russ Fetterman from Russ and Daughters and

Lauren Alvarez (1:02:53)
Wow.

christina grdovic (1:02:55)
The research is so fun. Yesterday, I had breakfast at Russ and Daughters with Nikki Russ Fetterman. So that was really fun just to like, just talk about how they're growing that brand, but protecting that brand. I have been, you know, a fan friend of Danny Meyer for so, so many years, but I'm sort of excited to go back and reread his book, Setting the Table, because, you know, even though it's 15 years ago, 17 years ago, something like that, there's still so much.

Lauren Alvarez (1:03:20)
Yeah.

christina grdovic (1:03:25)
much relevance in there.

Lauren Alvarez (1:03:27)
I carry so many of the things from that book with me. I mean, just that constant gentle pressure mentality is like always what I'm thinking about as a leader. Like, yeah.

christina grdovic (1:03:33)
Yeah, I'm excited to read it now because obviously I read it back in the day. He was another speaker at one of our Food and Wine Sales meetings and we were promoting the book at the time. So I'm excited to talk to him now because even though I've followed his career,

Lauren Alvarez (1:03:37)
Yeah, sure.

christina grdovic (1:03:48)
I have to actually figure out how to squeeze it all into an hour because obviously you could talk to him for many, many, many hours, which actually just made me think of another book. I'm a big fan of Will Gadara's Unreasonable Hospitality, which is kind of an offshoot of Danny Meyer, right? Because Will worked for Dan and then he went and opened Eleven Madison Park and now he has the Welcome Conference. And Unreasonable Hospitality is not just for restaurateurs, but anybody in any service business. And it is just chock full.

Lauren Alvarez (1:04:02)
I haven't read that, yeah.

christina grdovic (1:04:18)
of good advice.

Lauren Alvarez (1:04:20)
That's amazing.

you talked about talking to Danny Myers for hours. I mean, how am I gonna talk to you for anything less than like six hours? I don't know. Unfortunately, we're coming up on time. No, seriously, it's been such a pleasure just to learn more about your trajectory.

christina grdovic (1:04:28)
You're so nice.

Lauren Alvarez (1:04:34)
I mean, one thing I'd love is for you if you could share one final thought that you want to leave our listeners with today.

christina grdovic (1:04:40)
Gosh, I mean, I think the final, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I guess the most, I don't know if it's, I don't know if I'd say it's the most important thing. So it's a final thought. The final thought is just to always, always be learning. And right, like I think back on my days at Food and Wine, and like I said, it was a dream job and it was so great.

but it's so different than what it's like to work at a startup now. And I think there were things that I could have learned while I was there that I didn't because people stayed in their lane. And I think now, not just at startups, I don't think people stay in their lane as much because people don't have as much help as they used to, right? Like we used to have assistants and like there was just more infrastructure. And so it's so important to be able to do so many different things. And so,

Yeah, always be learning.

Lauren Alvarez (1:05:40)
Thank you so much for joining me today.

This has been so awesome just having you on the show learning more about your story and it's just been such a treat.

christina grdovic (1:05:48)
Lauren, I can't thank you enough. Thank you so much for taking me back down memory lane. I've loved, loved, loved every minute of it.

Lauren Alvarez (1:05:55)
Thank you. And this has been Don't Fuck This Up, the podcast answering the ultimate question, how the fuck did you land that cool job? I'm your host Lauren Alvarez and we will talk to you next week.