Janice Buckingham logged in to her restaurant’s Instagram account on May 22 to write a post about its impending closure.
“I love this place. I love the team. I love food. I love customers and all of you. “I appreciate everything anyone has done to support the dream,” wrote Buckingham, owner and chef at Daydream in Calgary’s Bridgeland.
“We are facing a closure within a month without at least a 30% increase in revenue. I am afraid we have not reached enough people in enough time to settle down and be stable.”
After I clicked a post in her post, everything changed.
Influential and business lady Gillian Harris, a former star of The Bachelorette and former host of HGTV’s Love It Or List It, shared Buckingham’s post in the Instagram story section and encouraged her 1.3 million followers to support Daydream.
“I didn’t expect a miracle to happen, that’s for sure, but that’s exactly what happened,” Buckingham said.
The restaurant, which opened in March, received an outpouring of online support and the business skyrocketed.
Screenshot of the Instagram post of the famous influential person Gillian Harris, showing support for Daydream. (Gillian Harris / Instagram)
“We’ve increased our sales by about 300 percent,” said Buckingham, who saw more than twice the usual number of customers this week.
The trained chef recognizes Harris, a former Alberta who now lives in Kelowna, British Columbia, as much of this change in income.
Buckingham, pictured here, shed “tears of joy” as her restaurant began to fill with more customers after her Instagram post went viral. (Submitted by Janice Buckingham)
“There’s no doubt about it,” said Buckingham, who taught at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York.
“[Harris] shares the best things. People really trust her as an influencer. She also shares things from the heart. “
Peeling the curtain
Buckingham said she decided to share the vulnerable post only after “downloading all stops”, including extending her business hours and launching a loyalty rewards program to try to attract people to her restaurant.
She already has a four-year vegan cheese business called Flora Fromage, which can be found at 17 local retailers, and was hoping customers would switch to Daydream.
After seeing several months of losses and immersing most of her money in building the restaurant, Buckingham had no money left for marketing and felt “a little desperate.”
She told her six employees that they would probably lose their jobs in June.
Buckingham serves a vegetable menu at Daydream. (Submitted by Janice Buckingham)
“Tears were shed. I felt like grief, to be honest,” she said.
And then she brought that grief online.
“I felt this way, well, if I let people know and if I’m vulnerable and pull back the curtain and show them the struggle to do it not as a chain restaurant but as an independent restaurant, maybe people would want me to go out and help. I really believe so much in food, “she said.
After the publication, people started tagging Harris, who often promotes plant-based diets, and that caught her attention.
“We talked back and forth and she said she had closed some companies and she knew how difficult it was, and it just weighed on her and she wanted to do what she could.”
Gillian Harris wrote a series of posts in her history on Instagram on May 23 in support of Buckingham’s Daydream restaurant, which was on the verge of closing. (Gillian Harris / Instagram)
In his Instagram story, Harris wrote in one of his posts: “I know too well the struggles of trying to start a new business and the failure… I will never forget that feeling. I believe this little shop is in Calgary… please flood it with love and business if you can. “
Buckingham said that after Harris’s publications, things started to gain momentum.
“Those were happy tears for me,” she said.
“In the end, the traffic coming through our doors was what I envisioned in my business plans, so it was surreal. It was surreal that I finally witnessed what I knew all along was possible.
The business grew so much, Buckingham rented an extra dishwasher for the weekend.
“I am very optimistic,” she said.
“If we manage to get through this summer with good numbers, then we are golden.”
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