Meet The Creator of Caribbean Chocolates

Meet Winona Nutter

Creator of Caribbean Chocolates

When we interviewed Ms. Winona Nutter, we found that these were
created by no ordinary woman. She started playing with chocolate
recipes at home. She says she plays with it until she "gets a knock your
socks off recipe, and then I add it to our product line. Knock your socks
off is right!

I asked her what made her take the plunge in to business and how did
she know it would work? Ms. Winona said "the short answer is,
I didn't. I know what I like and knew that it was really good, so
other people would like it too. I started out making them for church
and community fund raisers, putting them in specialty wrappers. I worked
fairs, carnivals - anyplace they needed something to sell, I was there. I
started making them for wedding and anniversaries, having wrappers
made for the particular event. It wasn't always easy though. I was
almost 60 and my husband was 70 and retired. We were afraid to incur
debt and take out loans at our ages, so we bit the bullet and just paid for
all the equipment we need as we grew. Although we knew we had a very
good product it was scary. We didn't know if we would be able to pay the
bills and all the overhead. We toughed it out, and now we don't owe
anybody anything"

"My advice to women out there thinking of starting a business
is to have a back bone of iron.
You have to be very strong and sure of yourself.
You have to be nervy to step out and do your own thing."

"Another piece of advice is to get more money than you think
you will need. Things always cost more, and unexpected things arise".

"Paperwork was another big challenge. It was like making your way
to get through a paper jungle to get started. All the licensing and
business registrations, what we needed to do to meet codes, permits,
taxes..... Paperwork is not something I'm that good at or that
interested in. I called in help from my family so I could just focus
on making the product and making sure we were putting out the best
chocolates we could possible make."

"If I had it to do over, I would have started earlier. Once you know
what you want to do it just clicks. This would have been great to do as I
was raising my children, as my time could be my own. My schedule could
be modified to meet their needs."

"The other advice I would give to women as they start out is pretty much
the same as what I have always told my kids:

Don't be a follower regardless of what your friends do.
You be the example.

The second thing is to take care of yourself. I may not always be
around. Fight back. You are nobody's punching bag. Speak up for
yourself and hit back if necessary. Don't be nasty or
disrespectful, be polite, but don't be a rug."

Thank you Winona!