From Boardroom to Kitchen: How One Atlanta Mom Is Redefining Mealtime with Livin

Atlanta mom and corporate-executive-turned-entrepreneur Erica Tuggle grew up with a mother (and a grandmother) who cooked dinner from scratch every night. Erica values flavor and nutrition, enjoys cooking, and loves the idea of planning, preparing and presenting homemade meals to her family, but as is the case in many modern households, there simply isn’t time. She has solved the never ending “what’s for dinner?” question for Atlanta families such as her own in a way that she is uniquely qualified to do.

Since earning her MBA from Harvard Business School, Erica has worked in the food and beverage industry for nearly 15 years. She began as a marketing executive with General Mills in Minnesota, and then moved to Atlanta to join Coca-Cola, ultimately serving as brand director of food strategy for Coke. All the while, she’s been deeply attuned to various roles that food plays in peoples’ lives. Food is of course fuel, but it’s also emotional comfort and social connection. Ever since she became a mother in 2015, the deeper value of food and time spent eating together as family became increasingly important to her. But her career was in full swing… How was she supposed to replicate the handmade, heartfelt efforts of her mother’s cooking for her own children? 

Given her in-depth understanding of all things food, she realized she was well positioned to take a leap away from a secure career path and into the unknowns of entrepreneurship in order to create Livin: a service that connects individual clients (most often families) to professional chefs who cook meals in the client’s own home. Livin's primary function is to provide people with fresh, healthy, delicious food. Erica has made the luxury of a private chef available to “regular” families because her platform allows people to hire a chef as infrequently as once a month -- or as regularly as multiple times a week. Livin chefs spend approximately two hours in each client’s home, preparing multiple portions of two to four meals, which can then be refrigerated or frozen depending on the family’s needs. This model allows the chefs to cook for several different families each day. Surprisingly, the cost per meal is comparable or less expensive than her competitors’ pre-made meal options.

Other outsourced solutions to the “what’s for dinner” quandary may indeed put food on the table, but Livin offers secondary benefits that no meal delivery service or restaurant delivery app can provide. When a real person comes to your home to cook, the food is being prepared specifically for you. There’s a qualitative difference in the experience of eating a meal that was cooked with you in mind. And there’s also the educational and experiential component of letting children observe and learn how groceries become dinner. Just because parents may need to be on a call or working in the other room, Erica shares that kids enjoy hanging around the kitchen watching the chef work. The problem with meal delivery, Erica explains, is that while the food may be acceptable, “you lose the element of process -- and connecting to the process of what makes a meal come together is really valuable for both kids and adults.” Even if kids aren’t present while the chef is working, the delicious smells of their handiwork linger in the home and add a human as well as sensory element to the dinner experience.

Erica isn’t sure she would have had the courage to launch her own business if her kids’ experience of food and mealtime wasn’t on the line -- but she knew she had an opportunity to create her own legacy of home cooked meals for her children to savor. The thing she loves most about having a chef come to her home once a month is that she has total confidence in the quality of the food her family receives. She -- and every client -- can specify how much sodium, sugar, etc. they want in their meals, or whether they want organic ingredients or other accommodations. And one additional bonus she’s observed in her own home: when her kids get to watch the chef cook, they’re more curious about food and flavor. They’ve always been fairly adventurous eaters since Erica prioritizes homemade and ethnic foods, but they love seeing the process of professional meal preparation. And have learned that chef-made food is especially delicious! Their current favorite dinner is a salmon filet with peach salsa. To offer dishes like these and more to your family, visit Erica’s website: https://www.chooselivin.com. Bon appetit!