Katherine's Chocolate Kompany $-$ Part $1$ Katherine's Truffle Kreations $-$ The Early Years

Dr$.$ Michael Breward, MBA CMA

University of Winnipeg

In $2007,$ Katherine Mann was a p astry chef at Jonathan's, a h igh$-$end restaurant in Oakville, Ontario. While she enjoyed going to work every day, as with a lot of people she dreamed of owning her own business. While she liked the restaurant business, she had no desire to actually run a restaurant. She was already putting in a tremendous amount of hours and knew that owning a restaurant would not only add to her time at work, it would inevitably take away from her timft in the kitchen. And ultimately, creating desserts was what she loved to do in the first place. She was particularly proud of her chocolate truffle creations, which were served as an after$-$dinner snack $"$on the house," and restaurant patrons often asked if they could buy some to take home. While Katherine thought this was a great idea, the restaurant owners told her that they were not in the chocolate selling business and, as such, would not pursue it$.$ While she was disappointed, Katherine did see their point.

One day, she happened to be talking to a regular restaurant patron who was not only a realtor but also knew of her desire to be her own boss and her skill at making truffles. He told her he had a