Today we’d like to introduce you to Sue Lee.
Hi Sue, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
I was so bored at home during the start of pandemic and have always wanted to start a food blog because eating good, authentic dishes is my passion. I was telling my friends about it over lunch a few weeks prior before everything closed down and they encouraged me to just go for it. That is exactly what I did. I started posting about all the restaurants I ate at before the pandemic and all the delicious food on Instagram. I had so much content to post since I ate out all the time and it was coming together beautifully. My Instagram grid was colorful and bright and I believe that caught a lot of people’s attention. I also used a lot of hashtags.
Before long, I was getting comments from other restaurants or food companies about reusing my pictures for their Instagram. Of course, they were always welcome to use my food pictures and then my followers started really building up. Every time I posted about a dish from a restaurant, they thanked me for bringing attention to their business. I thought to myself at the time, hmmm, I can really use this Instagram platform to bring customers to the restaurants I was posting about. Business was really bad during the start of the pandemic and I felt like I should help restaurant owners in some way to bring attention to them. As my Instagram grew, I would post about food products I brought from grocery stores that were really tasty or delicious to share with my followers. I then started to get offers for collaborations from food companies and restaurants and the rest is history!
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I would say the biggest obstacle for me is time and the fact that I am a perfectionist. I have to take 10 or 20 takes of the same image to get the perfect shot. Sounds crazy but I always want to present my best work, especially if it is a collaboration and a company is depending on me to help bring attention to their business! Time is of the essence and I don’t have much of that these days. I do work a full time job during the day besides my Instagram and food blog, plus I have two little boys to take care of, so time management is very important to succeed!
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I create content for food companies, whether in a form of a post and/or stories on Instagram. I love creative content and I definitely put in 100% in all of the videos/pictures I have created. I am most proud of the moment when I was only 6 months into my venture when a popular magazine company in the DMV area asked me to be a part of their holiday campaign to advertise beer. That really was a defining moment for me. There are so many food influencers out there but they chose me to represent them and I was so incredibly proud of that. Moving forward, that collaboration alone only made me worked harder and motivated me to do better. I think what sets me apart from others is that besides being a mother and working a full time day job, I do this out of actually loving to eat. I love tasting delicious food and sharing recommendations to others and am so passionate about that.
Do you have any advice for those just starting out?
My advice is to always stay true to yourself and remain humble. Show everyone who you really are, not a fake online version of you. I realized that doing stories on Instagram and showing my face is always a favorite for my followers. Even for the food companies and restaurants that want to do collaborations with me, they have always mentioned that seeing me talk about a food product is what makes my Instagram account exciting. They love seeing who is driving the account and that a real human being is behind all of this, not just pictures of food. That’s what I wished I knew starting out. I should have done more face to face interactions with my followers over stories and more pictures of myself holding food products.
Contact Info:
- Email: suefoodblogitinerary@gmail.com
- Website: https://suefooditinerary.blogspot.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suefooditinerary/
