Kristýna Schreiberová InFLOWer

Tell us a little about yourself: What field do you work in and how did you get there?

My name is Kristýna Schreiberová, I am 27 years old and I am a mother of two boys. Although I graduated from the Janáček Conservatory in Ostrava, majoring in acting, my great love for gastronomy stems from my childhood, which is also the foundation of my business

My husband and I created the InFLOWer catering project, where I create vegan food, while my husband mainly takes care of the coffee section. (You may also have heard InFLOWer in connection with "gastronomy training", which is the other part of our business, but more on that another time.)

As a child, my mother often took me out for pizza, my grandfather and grandmother for dinner. Food has always been very important in our family. My father is a trained chef and my grandmother cooked so well that I always had something to eat from her even after lunch at school. Now in retrospect I know that the most important ingredient in all their meals was unconditional love – for cooking and for family.

The first encounter with gastronomy outside the family was an unexpectedpart-time job in the second year of high school in the theater cafe Stará aréna. My roommate casually asked me if I wanted a part-time job, that they were looking for someone to work at the bar. And I said yes. And it was the best decision, because I found what I really enjoyed and what fulfilled me. I made coffee, drinks and beer (and, at the very end, operation of the bar) there throughout high school, and in addition to that, I sometimes happened to gather other experiences in different cafes, restaurants, hotels or bistros and tried out different job positions.

At the age of 19, shortly after my wedding, I decided to open my own cafe in the center of Ostrava. Back then, I thought I had to have everything I wanted right away, and without any business plan or experience, I took a space downtown and then started to figure out the rest. At that time, my beloved grandmother was very supportive, although she was not happy about it at all. Others, out of fear of failure, rather threw sticks under my feet, saying that it was stupid, that it couldn't work out. That a young girl without money and experience cannot be a successful entrepreneur. That I should rather go to work, like a "normal person". They were right in a way because this business really didn't work out. Unfortunately, I'm the kind of person (or fortunately? :) ) that I have to see everything for myself, so for the first time in my life I got quite burned. This was a huge and expensive lesson - financially, physically and mentally, but I don't regret it one bit.

In a year and a half of the whole story of the "Či ja vim" cafe, I learned so many things that I would have normally spent ten years learning and maybe never even learned them. But mainly thanks to the cafe, I started to create catering services, which are my business now.

Although now my work doesn't look anything like it did back then (no more chicken cutlets and salami spreads!), it planted the seeds for what I create now. For my business, hobbies and love in one.

Why is the "green", i.e. ecologically sustainable dimension of business important to you and why do you think that other entrepreneurs should also deal with it?

I think it would be great if every person started to think more ecologically, which is the first step. Entrepreneurs have the advantage of having a lot of influence over the customer and thus a great field where they can start to change things for the better. We should realize how important our planet is to humans / us, and how disrespectfully we  treat it. All it takes is for each of us to make a few small changes. Limit use of plastics, take one trip to work  using public transport, or walk instead of going by car. Not eating meat every day. And I could go on like this for a long time.

When I started creating catering years ago, I didn't care about the quality of the ingredients. I needed to buy the cheapest possible raw materials to earn the most. I cooked low-quality meat from large-scale farms, which are now unappetizing to me. At the time, I didn't even think that it could be any other way. When I returned to professional cooking now, after a three-year maternity break, I only cooked vegetarian and vegan food. I realized how people are addicted to meat and obsessed with the cruel meat industry. I recommend to  each of you to look into how things work in large farms. And I said to myself: I don't want to support this. I will show people that it can be done without meat and that it can be just as delicious.

I started paying close attention to where the food I cook comes from. Are the tomatoes from Czech Republic? Preferably from a farm outside the city or had they traveled halfway around the planet?Are they tomatoes that have traveled halfway around the planet? Or are they Czech, preferably from a farm outside the city?

After a year and a half, it was no longer enough for me, so I started looking for ways to reduce animal products as much as possible. The dairy industry is not much better. Now I make a purely vegan meal. I'm always looking and trying, learning and improving. And what I enjoy the most about it is that I get pretty good at convincing the die-hard carnivores that vegans really aren't just eating salad, that vegan food can be very tasty and varied. I'm getting great feedback and the customer base is growing more and more, for which I'm extremely grateful.

What advice would you give to ladies starting a business?

You definitely need to be persistent. Not giving up after the first failure. Knowing that everything doesn't have to be great / covered in sunshine all the time. Even steps that may not seem right at first glance can be the ones that lead us to happiness and success. We have endless opportunities to try and grow. All you have to do is make a decision and really want it, because we are the creators of our lives. It just takes discipline, vision and confidence. Always trying and searching, constantly educating yourself not only in your field. We should not take mistakes negatively, but rather as lessons for our journey, which is also a goal.