402: Ciara Bennett on Premium Homemade Granola.
Creating a line of homemade nutritious and delicious snacks.
Ciara is the founder of VintageOats, a Phoenix based, premium granola company. Originally from Joliet Illinois she has been a resident of Arizona for over 20 years. As a proud mother of a 2 and 7-year-old she was looking for better choices to feed them and her journey was the inspiration to launch her company.
She is the creative mind behind all her premium flavors of granola, which focus on healthy, non-GMO ingredients and no artificial flavors, preservatives or colors. Primarily selling at farmers markets and other local events, she is expanding to offer her homemade premium granola products online.Don’t miss an episode! Click here to sign up for podcast updates
In This Podcast:
As a young mother of two, and having just left corporate America, Ciara Bennett wanted something that was going to be helpful and healthful for her young children. An inspiration to start making high-quality snacking granola also moved her to build a business around this product while allowing her to keep her own identity. Now she makes Vintage Oats, a line of premium granola with unique & tasty flavors her kids love and so do her customers.
Listen in and learn about:
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- How she got her vision in 2017
- Was looking for purpose and praying for guidance and everything came all at once
- Creating granola at home and sharing with her friends
- Providing both good food and a great example for her kids
- Was working 9-5 in corporate America but felt like a number
- Being an entrepreneur and having control over life
- Liking that her personal style carried the impression of high quality and premium
- Her website carries the same flavor
- How her kids responded to the granola
- Bringing her product to the farmers markets and other local events
- Being able to share her story with her customers and getting great responses
- Her lack of training on running a business
As well as:
- Her failure – Being in her kitchen testing recipes in the beginning and burning the results time after time; and getting some negative feedback while she was starting out.
- Her success – Coming up with the vision for this business and bringing it to fruition.
- Her drive – She wants to change the generation going forward and be great for herself and the people around her.
- Her advice – Don’t allow fear to control your life.
Ciara’s Book recommendations: 
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
How to reach Ciara:
Website: www.vintageoats.com
Facebook: VintageOats
Instagram: VintageOats
UrbanFarm.org/vintageoats
Note: You can also find these books mentioned above at one of our favorite local independent bookstores and have the satisfaction of knowing you are supporting a small business.
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So proud of Ciara and her accomplishments especially as a single mother of 2 and the enthusiasm about her. She is definitely a visionary and go setter model for anyone to pattern after. This is a testament of prayers answered. Go Ciara and keep smiling!