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    The Pampered Chef

     
    11/14/2005

    Finding ways to spend more time with family is a dilemma that faces working moms and dads. In 1980, Doris Christopher, a housewife and former home economics major, blended a budget of $3,000 with her passion for teaching and cooking and launched the Pampered Chef, a line of housewares designed to trim time in the kitchen.

    This book is the inspirational story of how one entrepreneur’s convictions about making time for loved ones neatly dovetailed with a hunger in the market for clever, practical, and affordable kitchen tools. A Pampered Chef bestseller, for instance, is a pizza stone that can also be used to bake cookies, heat appetizers, and warm up leftovers.

    Christopher got her start conducting in-home demonstrations. She distributed time-saving recipes at the end of her presentations. These demonstrations soon caught on and she eventually hired a sales force of “kitchen consultants” to help satisfy customer demand. Twenty-five years later, the Pampered Chef is a billion-dollar business that has outgrown her 400-square-foot basement and now enjoys a 780,000-square-foot facility. There are over 70,000 kitchen consultants and twelve million customers. In 2002, Christopher sold the Pampered Chef to Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway Group; she remains president and chairman.

    Through humble narrative, Christopher shares the highs and lows of her entrepreneurial venture. She kept her priorities straight: It was always about family. She believed that if you focus on what’s important, success will follow. For her it did.

    - Sarah Jane Gilbert

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