Meet Lisa Brocato

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Lisa Brocato. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Lisa below.

Lisa, thank you so much for making time for us. We’ve always admired your ability to take risks and so maybe we can kick things off with a discussion around how you developed your ability to take and bear risk?

To grow and succeed you must take risks. We realize that not all risks are going to turn out favorably. In those cases, we use those risks as lessons learned and try to recover as quickly as possible, but when risks pay off it’s like a jolt of motivation to keep the momentum going. In our minds our business process is fluid, it must have some flexibility and that gives us the confidence to take more risks. I’ve been in some form of sales my entire career and one of my first sales directors said, “Some will, some won’t, so what!!!” That motto was a game-changer in how I approached risk and took chances.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

Rooted Locally is a family-run, indoor vertical farm. We grow microgreens, herbs and edible flowers in a controlled environment using non-GMO seeds, no pesticides and state-of-the-art LED lights. We started in 2016 after being inspired at a food conference about the farm-to-table movement and saw a void in our local food eco-system that we could fill. We grow more than 500 trays of our product each week at our facility on Cayuga Road that are distributed to about 50 local restaurants, two regional food wholesalers and at the Elmwood Village Farmers Market.
At the Elmwood Village Farmers Market on Saturdays from May through the end of October we also make artisan pizzas using local ingredients. Our background in food service made this a natural expansion for us.
For the last 8 years my husband, Justin, and I have been able to work alongside each other to grow our business and what really makes that special to us is that our two children, Justin Jr. (17) and Amelia (16), have grown up working with us too. The life lessons we have been able to share with them from a young age have been priceless. They see that hard work and determination does pay off. We are blessed to have the most incredible and supportive customers too. I get so much joy seeing everyone on Saturdays at the Farmers Market and hearing what’s going on in their lives.
We are excited about our upcoming expansion of our indoor grow facility which will double our grow space and allow us to increase our product lines even more.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

1) Stamina – when starting your own business you’ll need this. It’s a grind almost every day because there are so many things to manage. My best advice to keep the stamina going is to live by the mantra of “Work hard, play hard.” Remember to reward yourself with time away. It can truly refuel your soul.

2) Ask questions – there are people who have been where you are or are in the same spot now and if you ask them lots of questions you may just save yourself a lot of time or money by the lessons they already learned from risks that may not have worked out for them. Most people are more than happy to share their experiences – good or bad.

3) Remember “your why” – if you’re struggling with a decision or feel overwhelmed think about your reason for starting your business. It will help you refocus and keep on track.

We’ve all got limited resources, time, energy, focus etc – so if you had to choose between going all in on your strengths or working on areas where you aren’t as strong, what would you choose?

I think it is better to play into your strengths. It’s ideal to have some knowledge in as many areas as possible, but in the long run you will be more effective if you focus on what you’re good at and rely on a partner, co-worker, consultant, etc. in the area(s) you may struggle with. As a business owner time is the most valuable resource so don’t waste it on a task that will take you twice as long to do than someone who is better at it than you.
A couple of personal examples from our business – 1) My husband and I have been married for 20 years so we know each other’s strengths and areas of weakness and try to divide and conquer the tasks that way. 2) I am not great at posting to TikTok because I’m not super familiar with it, but my daughter is. So what takes her 10 minutes to create might have taken me 30 minutes or longer. I want to have exposure on that platform, but she’ll help us get the best engagement because she gets it better than I do.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://rootedlocally.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rootedlocally/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rootedlocally
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@rootedlocally

Image Credits

Lisa Brocato