Looking Back on 10 Years of Jovial

When I turned 40, my Italian friend said to me, “You are starting the second half of your life, think about what you want to achieve.” Shortly thereafter, we had the idea of starting a new brand of organic foods that brought a new grain to people called einkorn, as well as gluten and allergen free products made with the best ingredients. When it came time to choose the name for the company, I thought about the second half of my life and all that I wanted was joy, and so I decided to call the brand jovial. Not that I had not been happy in the first half of my life, but I am one of those fortunate, unfortunate people that has had to turn hardships into happiness time and time again.

My life completely changed forever at age 16, when my father was diagnosed with lung cancer. At that carefree time in my life, I did not even know what the word cancer meant. I whispered the news to my friend in English class about the diagnosis and asked if that was bad, and she confirmed. My heart hurt. Her father owned the funeral home in town, so she knew these things. Before my father passed less than a year later, he took my mother, one of my brothers and I to Italy to meet relatives for the first time. It didn’t take me long to fall in love with Italy and to promise myself I would be living there one day.

I still remember probably the only words of advice my mother gave me as a teenager. “Carla, it doesn’t matter how much you love someone, if he can’t provide for you, you’ll never be happy.” I know she was going through a difficult time in her life, sending three of her children to college on a bricklayer’s salary, but her words angered me. Did she really think I needed a man to support me? That day, I promised myself I would never become the engineer my father dreamed of, but I would own my business and work and live however I wanted to. And, I would marry whomever I chose. Naturally, a few years later, I fell in love “at first sight” with probably one of the poorest men of Northern Italy.

I met Rodolfo when studying abroad for a year in college at the University of Bologna. I had no idea he had also lost a family member as a teenager to cancer. His experience was probably worse than mine, seeing his older brother by a year die from leukemia at just 13.  I also didn’t know at the time that this tragedy, like the passing of my father, had caused his family financial hardship. The following year after graduation, I moved to Italy. The two of us had no money, so we walked the streets of Bologna dreaming of eating out or buying a newspaper. I was working as a translator and he was working in an agricultural company, but we were so far behind in life, I convinced him to follow me to America where there was opportunity. I wanted to start a business and I promised him we would do something related to Italy, so he could return home to see his family. He dreamed of becoming a farmer and it was hard for him to leave his country, but I promised him we would do well enough so that someday we could buy a farm of our own.

Our life continued to be barraged by tragedy. First, another brother of Rodolfo’s was paralyzed in a car accident, then my mother was diagnosed with cancer. At the time my mother was diagnosed, we were still trying to figure out what to do with our lives. I started to give Italian lessons in our community to make a little money, and one of my students mentioned I should go to see a store about an hour away called Bread and Circus in Providence, RI. As soon as I walked into what would eventually become Whole Foods Market, I knew I wanted to work in the health food industry. The next year, at age 27, Rodolfo and I teamed up with a family in Tuscany who had started a brand called bionaturae. Since we had very little money, instead of starting our own brand, we asked to distribute their products. I went to my brother Mike, who had become a bricklayer like my father, and asked him if he wanted to be a partner in the company and loan me money. He trusted his life’s saving over to me, and we took a mortgage out on my parent’s home, and started our first business. The three of us lived together, and while Rodolfo and I worked at the company, he continued working as a bricklayer and would leave money on the kitchen table for groceries, since we could not afford to take a paycheck. I still remember when the first truck pulled up to pick up an order. The driver said he needed to sign the Bill of Lading. I didn’t even know what that was, so I ran to my landlord Frank in a panic and asked if he had one. We learned, we struggled, and we eventually were able to establish the brand.

In 2008, when the economic crisis hit, the owners of the brand were having financial problems. It looked like we might lose it all, so we went back to Italy for the summer to figure out what to do. We decided to stay for 6 weeks and we moved in with my mother-in-law. At that time, Giulia was 6 and Livia was 3, and although Livia would look at me and ask where her little yellow house and toys in Connecticut were, not understanding exactly where she was, I saw how happy Rodolfo was to be home. My children still say that was the best summer of their lives- meeting their cousins for this first time, picking pomegranates and jumping bales of hay at sunset. When it was time to pack our bags and return to Connecticut, I told Rodolfo we were not leaving. He thought I was crazy. We had just bought a house in Connecticut. Our future was uncertain and we would have to start all over again, but I just knew it was the right thing to do, so we stayed.

Faced with losing everything, I began to think I should start a new company and our very own brand. At the same time, we were also struggling with Giulia’s health. Like her parents, she was born with food intolerances. I was very mindful about what she ate, but while we were staying with Rodolfo’s mother that summer, I did not cook and our diet included lots of regular wheat pasta and bread. It took just a few weeks for Giulia to develop asthma, a rash on her face that would not go away, bronchitis, bloating and diarrhea. She had these uncomfortable symptoms from birth, but all of sudden things got really bad. Her lymph nodes were constantly swollen, her hair was falling out, she was anemic, and having had so many people close to me with cancer, I became very concerned and started seeing doctor after doctor. Finally, Giulia tested for celiac disease and when the test came back negative, the doctor told me he was still certain she had gluten sensitivity and that eating gluten free would relieve her symptoms.

In a series of events that magically unfolded, Rodolfo and I learned about einkorn and began testing Giulia with it. She would eat only gluten free or einkorn, alternating between meals. In two months, her symptoms began to subside and in two years, she was feeling great. We knew we had to share this grain with others, so we started to work on a new brand. Even though we were already known in the industry, it was difficult to get jovial going. Consumers did not know the brand, and our einkorn pasta was in and out of Whole Foods in less than a year. Our brown rice pasta, which I knew was a superior product, just did not sell at first. I just wanted to tell my story, thinking if people knew how much we cared about quality, they would want to try our products. That’s when I had the idea of the culinary getaways. Although I would only be able to meet a small group of people at a getaway, I thought there would be more people out there who would see a more personal side of the company. After all, I knew I was exactly like my customer and if they could just meet me or hear my story, the word would spread about our products.

We worked hard, and slowly things picked up and we were able to grow the brand and bring awareness to einkorn and our brown rice pasta. In 2011, we were able to purchase the bionaturae brand. In 2014, we bought the Randall homestead and began building a home for our company. And that farm I promised Rodolfo? The same year we bought the property in Connecticut, we also bought a farm in Italy. The three properties we own, our home in Connecticut, our company headquarters, and our farm in Italy are all properties that no one wanted. Each one coincidentally with a street number of 41, each one a jewel in the rough that we bought because we could afford nothing better, each one exactly where we were unknowingly supposed to be.

We will never be any different than we were 25 years ago. Rodolfo, my brother and I continue to work hard every day to grow our business, to create ingredients that make a journey to better health more enjoyable, but also to stay financially strong and fiercely independent. I will never take on investors to grow my company quickly. I will continue to dream big, work hard, and believe that my future will unfold exactly as it is supposed to, in it’s own good time.

We have been working so hard these past 5 years especially, because we are looking forward to renovating the 1685 John Randall house and a barn on our property, as well as adding an inn where we will hold events and cooking retreats. This is my next dream, to bring together people who have faced loss and those who are seeking wellness in a beautiful place where we can learn from each other. Until I meet you there, I hope my story helps those who need it. Even if you have nothing, if you believe you can, and you work hard, anything is possible. Remember, when something seems to go wrong, stay grateful for the experience, stand strong, and something greater will unfold.  The dedication to my daughters in my cookbook continues to ring true in my life- On the other side of every challenge in life lies something beautiful and unexpected.