Today we’d like to introduce you to Travis Trody.
Hi Travis, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
My story, hmmm. Born and raised in Miami Dade County, Carol City to be exact. I have been in the restaurant industry for going on 9yrs now. I started as a dishwasher lol, I remember it like it was yesterday. Worked my way up through the ranks of line cook, to a private chef. I’ve had the opportunity to cook for Dan Marino, Patrick Surtain, Alonzo Mourning, and some famous golfers. That was a good time in my young career. I started to perfect, my craft and really started to buckle down. I do have to say while working at Yardbird on south beach, I have to credit an amazing chef, cherish smith, who made and molded me into becoming a better chef, I know I know he hated his name lol, but I said it. Fast forward I ended up moving more into the corporate world, introducing me to management. I fell in love with that, left for college in Tallahassee, and later, graduated. Thereafter, winded up in this beautiful city Orlando, Fl. and one of my college friends introduced me to the food truck world. I told her nope I don’t want to cook anymore. she took me around to different food trucks and showed me this food on Instagram, which to my eyes was just mediocre. You know being from Miami, the restaurant city, I said to myself hmmm maybe I can do this. I was managing this restaurant, (I won’t say the name) where the owners promised me a promotion and were paying me a horrible salary. This is the moment where I said to myself, I’m tired of getting screwed over with my salary and I wasn’t moving up fast as I wanted. So, there it was at that moment, Chef Wingking Miami style was born. I went into the recipe book I had written throughout my career and put together my menu. Now today I’m chef Wingking Miami Style with an upgrade from starting with an ironing board, and a tent. To now a food truck. The pandemic was rough, but me, I took benefit from it and I’m back after being shut down for two yrs. I’m shooting for the penthouse, hoping to meet Gary vee, also be a respected chef in my industry, along with all the greats. My success is important. One big reason is giving back, I want to help other entrepreneurs achieve their dreams, so they won’t have to go through what I went through not knowing valuable information.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Well let’s see, the first thing I would say is I overcame the biggest obstacle thus far, losing every single dime I had starting back in May 2019. I will never forget it, I felt defeated, helpless, and gave up. I literally went a whole week without eating. didn’t know what I was going to do, I woke up on a Wednesday, and went to the bible. and got life sucked back into me I went and got a job at bento at the time. While working, this guy who had just started said to me, “don’t give up”. After hearing that, I opened the business back and haven’t stopped since.
The next obstacle I would say is after starting back up, I was doing good, word of mouth traveled around, I was going around doing multiple events, each event people raved about my food, then Covid hit. For some, that ended their business, but for me, it allowed me the time I needed to work to renew my business, focus on marketing, and grow with the change that Covid brought. I studied every day how I would come back stronger and better. I also watched Gary V and listened to what he was saying as well.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
I most defiantly have to give praise to God; without him this couldn’t be. The strength He gave me was to handle all ups and downs of starting a business and then losing all my money. To learning everything the hard way and not having a mentor, then to getting back up, getting a food trailer, having more business, with money increasing, and much more. All thanks have to come to Him.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: wingking_miamistyle
- Facebook: wingkingmiamistyle
