An inclusive and sustainable culture builds a thriving hive
Frances Kroner, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Chef, Sleepy Bee Café, Cincinnati, Ohio
1 June 2023
France Kroner knew in her early teens, while helping out in a friend’s restaurant, she had found her passion for the food industry. In 2013, she along with her co-founders launched the Sleepy Bee Café in Cincinnati which now has expanded to four locations. ILO Photo/ Sleepy Bee Café
“I grew up in restaurants. I grew up right down the street in North Side and College Hill. One day, my next-door neighbours were opening a restaurant and they hired me to wash dishes. I was in high school at the time. From that day, I've worked in restaurants ever since” beams Frances Kroner, Executive Chef of The Sleepy Bee Café.
Frances Kroner grew up in College Hill, a neighborhood located eight miles north of downtown Cincinnati, Ohio. She has worked in some of the city's best restaurants and has run her own catering business prior to launching this bright bee-themed breakfast and lunch spot. The idea of the Sleepy Bee began with her personal commitment to source locally and serve delicious and well-balanced meals to everybody.
Inspired by her passion for exploring sustainability from a culinary lens, Chef Kroner, together with John Hutton and Sandra Gross, opened Sleepy Bee’s new branch restaurant’s doors to the public in College Hill ten years ago.
The Café’s food philosophy is inspired by bees and their contribution to biodiversity, sustainability, and safeguarding the environment. John and Sandra were struck by the fact that they could not get local eggs, syrup, or bacon in any restaurant in Cincinnati, so they approached Kroner who had been in the restaurant world for a while to consult on the restaurant.
“I basically convinced them to let me do it because they had no restaurant experience. We worked collaboratively, it took about a year to build it up and then we launched it: seven days a week, and we’ve been open ever since,” Kroner recalls.
“I was the Chef at the start and had Emma Cotter as my sous chef,” she says. “The two of us really co-piloted the business and I don’t think either of us could have ever guessed that we would be in the positions we are in now,” Frances confesses. Fast forward to today and she is the CEO and Executive Chef while Cotter is the Director of Operations and Sustainability.
“My entry and desire to work with food was based on my interest in food justice issues as well as social justice issues in general,” says Cotter, who is currently pursuing a Master’s in Sustainability.
United by their passion for food justice, sustainable practices, the well-being of their community, and creating a healthy work culture for their employees, Kroner and Cotter have been able to work together to put in place various systems and practices, to ensure that the “beehive” thrives on multiple fronts.
Chef Kroner and Emma Cotter, former sous-chef and now Director of Operations and Sustainability, worked long hours to launch the Sleepy Bee Café. Everyday they provide healthy breakfast and lunch items sourced from local suppliers. ILO Photo/ Sleepy Bee Café The Sleepy Bee Café, like many in the food industry, was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and had to shut down for a while. However, this time presented a positive turning point for the business allowing both Kroner and Cotter to take a step back and evaluate things and see where they could make improvements especially where the staff was concerned.
“COVID-19 gave us an opportunity to take a step away from the restaurant’s activity and figure out how we wanted to structure things moving forward,” Frances highlights. “That’s been a big part of where we are at today because of the work we put in to thinking about the restaurants during that time.”
“Honestly, the gift of Covid was a change of mindset, and realizing it was worth it to keep finding ways to give people good jobs and invest more, intentionally, in both our environmental and social missions. This made us care even more about continuing to do this work when everything at that time was quite hard,” adds Cotter.
When asked about business continuity during Covid, Kroner explains that the decision to close for two weeks was team-led, driven by a company-wide Google survey, as well as giving her the opportunity to figure out, from CDC advice, what the safest practices were and how to protect people when it was time to reopen.
“When we opened, we opened really small. We invited everyone on the team back to work if they wanted, and a lot of people asked to work more hours. They were very worried about not having an income,” explains Kroner.
Reopening the restaurant also meant scrambling to adapt to safety regulations, occupancy limits, and focusing on takeout to slowly bring people back into the restaurant. “A lot of our decisions were aligned with where the unemployment pay was, by facilitating hazard pay until people could get onto the system which was pretty swamped. We also continued to pay health insurance and offered free meals to everyone every day. A practice that continues until this day,” adds Kroner with a broad smile.
Building a culture of transparency and accountability, and how people are treated in the workplace, was another set of issue the pandemic helped put in focus. An HR consultant was brought in and a hotline for employees was set up. In addition, a pay equity system was implemented.
The Sleepy Bee Cafe uses their Hexonomics approach for management and operational decisions. This approach focuses on six key criteria: nourished guests, collaboration, powerful food, collective benefit, regenerative sustainability, and an inclusive, empowered team. ILO Photo/ Sleepy Bee Café “We instituted a $15 an hour wage minimum wage that no one would make less than that, and we also did a tip pool system so everyone working in the front and back of the house, excluding managers, was benefiting everyone,” explains Kroner. “That solved a lot of the really sticky issues for us in the restaurant industry because tipped wages, in general, have a sordid history and a racist past and we wanted to move away from it, and it's not easy.”
A tip pool means all of the tips collected are combined and redistributed fairly among all employees at the end of a shift. Kroner and Cotter knew that cooks make less than front-of-the-house staff, so they did an audit to see where they stand on this. “We totally levelled the playing field. Now everyone is making somewhere between $17 and $21 an hour with the tips,” proudly shares Cotter.
“We definitely lost some people to the fact that we chose this model, but overall, we feel like it’s a more equitable system, no matter where you are working in the restaurant,” adds Kroner.
In terms of environmental sustainability, the Sleepy Bee Café made conscious efforts to reduce their carbon footprint and switched to more energy-efficient appliances, while constantly experimenting with ways to meet the best business standards. This resulted in the company receiving their B Corp Certification which is awarded to companies who meet high standards of verified social and environmental performance, transparency and accountability.
“We hired someone during the pandemic to do an energy and carbon analysis for us. He looked at our food and our services to help us determine how we could best reduce our overall impact. We had already removed beef and lamb from our menus knowing that they had the highest footprint of all our menu items, and we had already been practicing composting and recycling our food waste,” explains Kroner.
“We also joined 513 Green, a sustainability certification program, and the 2030 District Network, which is a report card of buildings and how they are doing as far as energy, water, and gas usage, and compares you to other buildings.”
The Sleepy Bee is also actively working to connect and support surrounding communities with impactful social change initiatives. One endeavor is a partnership with Aiken High School where the café supports their farming and agriculture program. The students at the school raise llamas and chickens and will soon include bees.
Frances plans to expand the partnership by offering job training programs for students as well as sourcing fish from an aquaponics initiative that the school is currently implementing.
They also partner with Findlay’s Kitchen Incubator, located in the heart of the historic Findlay Market district. “Last year, Emma spearheaded an operations class for their students, and this year we did it together. It was really cool to talk to a group of people that are at the beginning of their culinary journey,” highlights Kroner.
Kroner and her team also focus on collaborating with the local community to have a positive impact on a broader scale. Chef Kroner says “a lot of our team members live around where we are located. They usually bring some of the community in with them and back home with them. But the community we have been most focused on is our internal community and how everything we are working on in developing is landing with them.”
As we end our conversation, we are presented with an information sheet on “Hexonomics” the lens through which all the decisions are made at Sleepy Bee. It was inspired by a book by Kate Raworth called “Doughnut Economics” It is another way of looking at economic challenges and traditional capitalism methods and its impact. So we looked at our business and created a hexagon, inspired by the shape of honeycombs,” explains Kroner.
“This approach has helped us to think seriously about all the things we touch such as our vendors, customers, our communities, and employees. And we all agreed that it has made it easier to make good decisions because it is rooted in our mission” Kroner adds.
Frances Kroner grew up in College Hill, a neighborhood located eight miles north of downtown Cincinnati, Ohio. She has worked in some of the city's best restaurants and has run her own catering business prior to launching this bright bee-themed breakfast and lunch spot. The idea of the Sleepy Bee began with her personal commitment to source locally and serve delicious and well-balanced meals to everybody.
Inspired by her passion for exploring sustainability from a culinary lens, Chef Kroner, together with John Hutton and Sandra Gross, opened Sleepy Bee’s new branch restaurant’s doors to the public in College Hill ten years ago.
The Café’s food philosophy is inspired by bees and their contribution to biodiversity, sustainability, and safeguarding the environment. John and Sandra were struck by the fact that they could not get local eggs, syrup, or bacon in any restaurant in Cincinnati, so they approached Kroner who had been in the restaurant world for a while to consult on the restaurant.
“I basically convinced them to let me do it because they had no restaurant experience. We worked collaboratively, it took about a year to build it up and then we launched it: seven days a week, and we’ve been open ever since,” Kroner recalls.
“I was the Chef at the start and had Emma Cotter as my sous chef,” she says. “The two of us really co-piloted the business and I don’t think either of us could have ever guessed that we would be in the positions we are in now,” Frances confesses. Fast forward to today and she is the CEO and Executive Chef while Cotter is the Director of Operations and Sustainability.
“My entry and desire to work with food was based on my interest in food justice issues as well as social justice issues in general,” says Cotter, who is currently pursuing a Master’s in Sustainability.
United by their passion for food justice, sustainable practices, the well-being of their community, and creating a healthy work culture for their employees, Kroner and Cotter have been able to work together to put in place various systems and practices, to ensure that the “beehive” thrives on multiple fronts.
Chef Kroner and Emma Cotter, former sous-chef and now Director of Operations and Sustainability, worked long hours to launch the Sleepy Bee Café. Everyday they provide healthy breakfast and lunch items sourced from local suppliers. ILO Photo/ Sleepy Bee Café The Sleepy Bee Café, like many in the food industry, was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and had to shut down for a while. However, this time presented a positive turning point for the business allowing both Kroner and Cotter to take a step back and evaluate things and see where they could make improvements especially where the staff was concerned.
“COVID-19 gave us an opportunity to take a step away from the restaurant’s activity and figure out how we wanted to structure things moving forward,” Frances highlights. “That’s been a big part of where we are at today because of the work we put in to thinking about the restaurants during that time.”
“Honestly, the gift of Covid was a change of mindset, and realizing it was worth it to keep finding ways to give people good jobs and invest more, intentionally, in both our environmental and social missions. This made us care even more about continuing to do this work when everything at that time was quite hard,” adds Cotter.
When asked about business continuity during Covid, Kroner explains that the decision to close for two weeks was team-led, driven by a company-wide Google survey, as well as giving her the opportunity to figure out, from CDC advice, what the safest practices were and how to protect people when it was time to reopen.
“When we opened, we opened really small. We invited everyone on the team back to work if they wanted, and a lot of people asked to work more hours. They were very worried about not having an income,” explains Kroner.
Reopening the restaurant also meant scrambling to adapt to safety regulations, occupancy limits, and focusing on takeout to slowly bring people back into the restaurant. “A lot of our decisions were aligned with where the unemployment pay was, by facilitating hazard pay until people could get onto the system which was pretty swamped. We also continued to pay health insurance and offered free meals to everyone every day. A practice that continues until this day,” adds Kroner with a broad smile.
Building a culture of transparency and accountability, and how people are treated in the workplace, was another set of issue the pandemic helped put in focus. An HR consultant was brought in and a hotline for employees was set up. In addition, a pay equity system was implemented.
The Sleepy Bee Cafe uses their Hexonomics approach for management and operational decisions. This approach focuses on six key criteria: nourished guests, collaboration, powerful food, collective benefit, regenerative sustainability, and an inclusive, empowered team. ILO Photo/ Sleepy Bee Café “We instituted a $15 an hour wage minimum wage that no one would make less than that, and we also did a tip pool system so everyone working in the front and back of the house, excluding managers, was benefiting everyone,” explains Kroner. “That solved a lot of the really sticky issues for us in the restaurant industry because tipped wages, in general, have a sordid history and a racist past and we wanted to move away from it, and it's not easy.”
A tip pool means all of the tips collected are combined and redistributed fairly among all employees at the end of a shift. Kroner and Cotter knew that cooks make less than front-of-the-house staff, so they did an audit to see where they stand on this. “We totally levelled the playing field. Now everyone is making somewhere between $17 and $21 an hour with the tips,” proudly shares Cotter.
“We definitely lost some people to the fact that we chose this model, but overall, we feel like it’s a more equitable system, no matter where you are working in the restaurant,” adds Kroner.
In terms of environmental sustainability, the Sleepy Bee Café made conscious efforts to reduce their carbon footprint and switched to more energy-efficient appliances, while constantly experimenting with ways to meet the best business standards. This resulted in the company receiving their B Corp Certification which is awarded to companies who meet high standards of verified social and environmental performance, transparency and accountability.
“We hired someone during the pandemic to do an energy and carbon analysis for us. He looked at our food and our services to help us determine how we could best reduce our overall impact. We had already removed beef and lamb from our menus knowing that they had the highest footprint of all our menu items, and we had already been practicing composting and recycling our food waste,” explains Kroner.
“We also joined 513 Green, a sustainability certification program, and the 2030 District Network, which is a report card of buildings and how they are doing as far as energy, water, and gas usage, and compares you to other buildings.”
The Sleepy Bee is also actively working to connect and support surrounding communities with impactful social change initiatives. One endeavor is a partnership with Aiken High School where the café supports their farming and agriculture program. The students at the school raise llamas and chickens and will soon include bees.
Frances plans to expand the partnership by offering job training programs for students as well as sourcing fish from an aquaponics initiative that the school is currently implementing.
They also partner with Findlay’s Kitchen Incubator, located in the heart of the historic Findlay Market district. “Last year, Emma spearheaded an operations class for their students, and this year we did it together. It was really cool to talk to a group of people that are at the beginning of their culinary journey,” highlights Kroner.
Kroner and her team also focus on collaborating with the local community to have a positive impact on a broader scale. Chef Kroner says “a lot of our team members live around where we are located. They usually bring some of the community in with them and back home with them. But the community we have been most focused on is our internal community and how everything we are working on in developing is landing with them.”
As we end our conversation, we are presented with an information sheet on “Hexonomics” the lens through which all the decisions are made at Sleepy Bee. It was inspired by a book by Kate Raworth called “Doughnut Economics” It is another way of looking at economic challenges and traditional capitalism methods and its impact. So we looked at our business and created a hexagon, inspired by the shape of honeycombs,” explains Kroner.
“This approach has helped us to think seriously about all the things we touch such as our vendors, customers, our communities, and employees. And we all agreed that it has made it easier to make good decisions because it is rooted in our mission” Kroner adds.