Entrepreneur's Name
Daniel Gray
Age
31
Location
Seoul, Korea
Company Name
Company Size
1-10 employees
What does your company do?
O’ngo Food Communications is a Culinary Tourism Company that offers food tours and cooking classes to visitors to Korea. We also do consulting, book writing, video production, and event planning in Korea. Our company has worked on many Korean Food Globalization projects such as the Korean Food Dictionary, Korea Culinary Tourism Research, Koreataste.org website, Kimchi Chronicles, and much more.
When and how did your company start?
The company was started in 2007 by Jia Choi PhD as a Food Styling Company. I joined in 2009 as a writer and marketer. Before this, I was a writer for different magazines and newspapers and on my own food blog, www.seouleats.com. While working with Jia we found that there was a mutual love of food and the goal of promoting Korean food overseas. We then formed a partnership to work on bigger projects related to the promotion of Korean food overseas.
What's been one of the hardest challenges in running a business?
Being responsible for other people and putting the company first before personal whims. It has made me want to stay healthy, stay composed and just take better care of myself because I am the face of the company. I need to be able to take care of my staff and nurture relationships for the future.
What do you enjoy most about your work?
That I took what I was most passionate about: food and writing and that we were able to make a business out of it. It is fun watching the business grow and I helping my employees. I like that we built an industry that wasn’t there before and now it is catching on.
Advice for people looking to start up their own business?
Follow what you are most passionate about. Then take a chance, go for broke. And if you fail, so what; there is always another chance, another opportunity.
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