We were lucky to catch up with Aria Starus recently and have shared our conversation below.
Aria, looking forward to learning from your journey. You’ve got an amazing story and before we dive into that, let’s start with an important building block. Where do you get your work ethic from?
Work Ethic runs deep in my blood stream and bones. I see work as a greater goal of goodness and life purpose. Being the granddaughter of immigrants on my moms side and the daughter of my father also an immigrant….all I know is work, education, and assimilation. The strive for this greatness not as a choice but out of survival. You don’t just try to succeed you try to excel.
My grandmother, an Auschwitz concentration survivor fought to survive to live to the end of each day. The choice of living is earned and what you make of each day is worked for.
This has never wavered for me. I am disciplined, passionate, and need purpose each and every day.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
FOUNDER / ARIA STARUS
Aria Starus began Foodies Urban Kitchen in 2011.
Her fascination with health food, production, manufacturing, nutrition, and research and development urged her to get heavily involved in Foodology, her family company. Foodology, which began in the 1980′s has been an innovator in the health food movement. A brand which started out as an urban farm in her backyard developed into a well known local and national brand that was shipped all over the country. It is here where she gained a wealth of knowledge in sales, marketing, employee management and overall company operations. The mission of Foodology, “providing affordable health food to the mainstream community” carries over into her own business philosophy.
In 2011 she started Foodies Urban Kitchen which provides small food companies the skills and tools to grow and thrive in the current food manufacturing landscape. Finally in 2012 she bought Healing Movement. She looks forward to growing this venture and educating the world on how to heal through pure foods. Currently she plays an advisory role at Foodies. The company operations have been taken over by a fantastic support staff that keeps this vision alive.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Work Ethic-essential to be an entrepreneur you need to be highly motivated. This is not a motivation steered by others around you this is an internal drive and motivation. You work for you, your time is your time but you have to discipline and structure that time for yourself. No one is pushing you to move forward it comes from within.
Focus-Clear mind, clear heart, clear intensions-The vision must be clear-what is the ultimate goal?, how, when, will you achieve it and how will it be measured?
Perseverance-never give up. When you work for yourself the last buck stops at you. Everyone gives up. You have to be aggressive you have to move things forward yourself and not wait on anyone else.
Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?
My mom Leslie Labowitz Starus. She is a hard shadow to follow. Talk about impact and purpose-her legacy is no easy shoes to fill. I have been raised that your life work and purpose can have a profound impact….and doesn’t need to be self-limiting. This perspective also comes with challenges. Am I enough? Is my legacy and path impactful? No pressure! But I have learned to do things with Intention and depth.
Leslie Labowitz-Starus, Los Angeles artist and entrepreneur, is best known for her public performance work on violence against women in collaboration with Suzanne Lacy from 1977–82. In 1972, she was a Fulbright scholar in Germany, where she worked with Joseph Beuys, and considers herself an Art/Life artist. Since 1980, her art work has shifted to ecological concerns, primarily focusing on food and agriculture. For over 30 years, Labowitz-Starus created performances and installations while building a business, called SPROUTIME. She began as an urban farmer, growing sprouts in her backyard in Venice and expanded her operation to a three-quarter acre agricultural site and food processing facility in the San Fernando Valley in LA County, growing, manufacturing and distributing organic products throughout Southern California. She is considered an expert in the field of sprouting and an authority on urban farming and farmers’ markets. In 2010, she received an “Innovation Leadership” award for Women In Business from the San Fernando Valley Economic Development Corporation.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.foodiesurbankitchen.com
- Instagram: foodiesurbankitchen
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
