Two days after taking a job for Tesla, owner of The Giving Pies got a simple text message canceling the order
A catering contract to celebrate Black Heritage Month turned into a tough lesson for a Black-owned bakery in the South Bay earlier this month.
What started as a $16,000 deal ended up costing the small business owner thousands of dollars instead.
On Valentine’s Day, the owner of The Giving Pies in San Jose’s Willow Glen neighborhood received a pretty sweet call from a representative with Tesla: a catering job for thousands of mini-pies for a Black History Month event.
Owner Voahangy Rasetarinera, who started the business out of her home in 2017, says both sides agreed on a quote and exchanged an invoice for 4,000 pies for delivery this week. Because of the tight turnaround, Rasetarinera asked staff to work extra hours, she bought ingredients and packaging supplies and declined at least three other catering jobs.
Having worked private dining gigs for many years, it is often the executive assistant who makes arrangements ahead of time. They work with what they think is the budget, but oftentimes when the actual executive shows up the day of, they want to make changes to what was planned. Since we always have a contract, they can’t go any cheaper than what was agreed (like, can’t cancel the open bar, etc) but they sometimes will decide to order more expensive wine, appetizers, etc.
I could see this being a case of an assistant of some sort making the deal over the phone, then getting shot down when their boss sees the price.
Not trying to make any excuses for Tesla here, just sharing my experience in a related field.