Giorgina Venzin and the art of making room

At Darvella, Giorgina had imagined a cabinet filled with cheeses and meats, drawing on a Swiss and European deli idea. She said it did not work. The stock was not moving, and the space was costing her money.

She had to change it quickly. Sandwiches took its place, with straightforward combinations such as chicken and avocado, and ham and cheese. The deli idea gave way to familiar food she said customers wanted.

The difficult part was recognising that something she had pictured so clearly was not working in practice. In her telling, the cost of keeping that cabinet as it was made the decision urgent. Affection for the idea could not fill the space or move the stock.

Change could be smaller, too. In another example, Giorgina described regulars returning while the sandwich selection stayed the same. She realised they needed something new, so another selection was introduced and the two offerings alternated. Keeping a regular customer interested still required attention.

At Rising Sun Rituals, she described refreshing a business rather than starting again. In her account, established regulars kept coming, and some familiar faces were pleased to see it getting busier.

She also accepted that some people would prefer things as they were. Research and a considered decision mattered; pleasing every customer was never going to be possible. There was a cost to leaving things alone, as well as a risk in doing something different.

The more personal admission came when Giorgina talked about managing her team.

She described having an excellent manager, then arriving during that manager's shift and taking over. A course brought that habit into focus.

"And I didn't realise I was doing that until I did that course," she said.

Afterwards, she stepped back and, she said, saw the manager flourish.

The change still guides what she does in a difficult situation. Giorgina said she now asks whether help is needed, or encourages the person to work through it themselves, instead of automatically taking charge. Someone employed to do a job needs a chance to do it.

She was clear that stepping back can be uncomfortable. Things may initially fall short of the standard an owner would achieve by doing everything personally. She described accepting that gap so a team member had room to improve over time.

The outcome she described was a team member beginning to feel that the place was theirs to look after. She distinguished that feeling of responsibility from financial ownership. It was about someone having enough space to grow into the work and care about how the business ran.

There was a benefit for the owner as well. Less time spent taking over gave her more room to focus on the rest of the business.

Letting go also came up when we discussed selling a business. Creating a concept, assembling a team and developing a menu are parts of the work she enjoys. When her enthusiasm for a particular venue has faded, she said, another owner may be able to give it more attention.

For Giorgina, recognising that point is part of looking after the business. The café still needs someone who wants to turn up for it.

In her earlier years, Giorgina had wanted more honest conversations with other people in hospitality.

"You'd say to everyone, how is business? And they'd all say it's amazing."

She wanted to be able to admit when things were tough. She described feeling lonely and not knowing many visible women in the industry whom she could ask out for coffee and talk to openly.

She said that had changed. Now she makes time for coffees, conversations and encouragement for other operators. The voice message came out of that same willingness to respond when somebody was having a difficult day.

Her own pleasures could be simple. Asked about her favourite thing in the cabinet, Giorgina worked through the options in her head. She likes custard, she said. But her choice was a plain doughnut with cinnamon sugar.

She also spoke about the human contact that draws people into small cafés. That morning, she said, a customer had sent her a message praising the new team at Rising Sun Rituals and saying how happy she was coming there.

For Giorgina, messages like that were among the special moments of the work. This one was about the people looking after the café and how they made a customer feel.