Darden Meetings and Special Events,
BCD Travel
q: What do you do?
a: Create, plan and execute meetings and special events for Darden Restaurants. A team of four of us (three are UCF graduates) manages 400 meetings and events each year. These include everything from an employee Earth Day celebration next week...to store openings across the U.S....to annual worldwide conferences for each restaurant brand.
q: What's your favorite part of the job?
a: Events at our new headquarters. This space lets us think outside the box. The lakeside parties are incredible.
q: What's the greatest challenge?
a: Pushing myself to be better, constantly inventing creative concepts for events that haven't been done before.
q: Do you stay in touch with any other UCF hospitality alums?
a: I live and work with Lisette Gonzalez '05. Also: Lauren Staiano '09, Melissa Beer '09 and Zack Myers '08.
q: Outside work...you're most likely to be seen?
a: At home, at the beach, fishing, or at my boyfriend's ranch in Tampa.
q: Your biggest accomplishment since graduating, outside your career?
a: Taking the initiative to start a mentor program for UCF hospitality students. Lauren Staiano '09 and I are working with Rosen College and the UCF Alumni Association to build a program that will match current students with alumni mentors.
q: How did UCF prepare you for what you do?
a: It was very hands-on. In my first internship, I spent a month ironing tablecloths and washing dishes. I learned all about different plate sizes and types of linens, which is helpful to my work today. The people at Rosen College teach you to be a go-getter. Other programs prepare you for success in your job, but Rosen also teaches you how to get the job.
q: Your favorite class?
a: Event Design, Production & Technology with Susan Lee. She shared her real-life business experiences with us, and did not hand-hold. We had to think and create the event ourselves. That class was great preparation for the real world, especially learning about timelines. The interviewer for Darden/BCD Travel was impressed with my portfolio, which focused on the event we produced for that course.
q: How could the hospitality program have been better?
a: I would have loved a mentor in the event management business. Also, the finishing details of an event (floral arrangements, napkins, etc.) are never formally taught through the curriculum, only perhaps through your internship or trial and error at student-managed events. A "set-up" or "day of event" class should be required.
q: A UCF memory?
a: The gloating when my team won the challenge in Quantity Food Production class! Melissa Beer '09 and I did a chest bump! It was so fun.
q: Favorite meal in Orlando?
a: The soup, salad and breadsticks at Olive Garden. Also, sushi at Shogun.
q: On your iPod?
a: On Pandora: Janis Joplin, Norah Jones, Tracy Chapman, Jack Johnson and JJ Grey & Mofro.
q: Little known fact about you?
a: I've also launched my own business called The Wedding Directors, together with my Mom. Our first customer was just happily married in South Florida.
