In this fast‑paced interview, Professor Pete Alexander hosts Mary Crafts, the former CEO and founder of Utah’s largest catering firm, Culinary Crafts, who recently launched a new venture, Mary Crafts Inc., focused on motivation and inspiration. Mary explains why she loves the blend of hospitality and motivational work, describing it as the "best of all worlds" where serving people and earning money intersect. She emphasizes a leadership philosophy that rejects distant, privilege‑based management in favor of working side‑by‑side with employees, urging leaders to walk the trenches, clean dishes, and show love‑based care rather than fear‑based control. Mary recommends that listeners check out Randy Garn, an entrepreneur she admires for grit and follow‑through. She shares a formative early job as a caregiver for a wheelchair‑bound 90‑year‑old woman, a experience that cemented her work ethic and taught her that service value isn’t tied to external appreciation. The episode closes with Mary directing listeners to her website (marycraftsinc.com) for more resources, including her podcast, fitness channel, and speaking engagements, while Pete promotes the Winning at Business and Life podcast across social platforms.
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This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast, where business leaders share their insights. It is 6 questions in 7 minutes because successful business leaders are busy and rarely have more time to spare. So let's get to it. Question number 1: In a few sentences, please tell me who you are and what you do.
Hi, I'm Mary Crafts. I'm the former CEO and founder of Culinary Crafts, which is Utah's largest catering and event planning company. But 2 years ago, I sold that. I started a new company called Mary Crafts Inc., and I'm launched into a new career.
Mary, it's great to have you on the show. Question number 2: What's the best thing about working in your industry?
My previous industry was the hospitality industry. My current one is motivation and inspiring people. Both come together to help people, serve people, and you get to make money at it. It's the best of all worlds.
I love it. I can hear the passion in your voice. It's so great. Question number 3: I have a fictitious book with all the answers for business. What chapter would you think most companies should read?
The first one.
Good deal.
You can jump to the last one and see if the end sounded good, but I always like to start at the beginning. I'm a very organized and to just skip around in the middle. Get to that first one. Fall in love with Pete. He has a great book.
Thank you for that. Question number 4: Other than the generic work harder, have a great attitude, and care for customers, what advice or insight would you give to other business leaders right now?
If you're a leader, you're experiencing something very different in your company. Whether you're a leader, a manager, top-level executive, that time of perk and privilege is gone. We need to jump back in to where we were when we started, and we were asking people not to work for us, but to work with us. Not to get to something, but to come along and let us join in. They need to see us now as team members. They were fine before that you had perk and privilege. Not anymore. When they are struggling, they need to see you beside them, caring and struggling right along with them.
And I would think that if they're— if you're working right side by side with them, that builds even more rapport with your employees because they feel like you're rolling up your sleeves and you're in the trenches with them.
Right? So many people now are just living in that fear-based kind of life, and what we're trying to move people to is to stay in a love-based life, even in the midst of all this fearful things. So the passageway between the two is to take their hand and walk with them. That's the kind of leader we want right now, who will get in, scrape dishes, clean grease traps, who will do whatever is needed, clean the toilets and walk through the passage so that they don't feel alone and abandoned where fear lives, but they feel embraced and loved on this side of the quad.
I love it. That is so insightful. Thank you. Question number 5.
Yeah.
What other business leader like yourself would you like to acknowledge and invite to be on my podcast?
Uh, hi, Randy Garn. He is a fabulous entrepreneur and he's one that knows how to follow what twinkles. But he also has the insight and the guts and the grit needed to follow through on those ideas to make sure that they happen. Great.
Well, I will reach out to Randy. Thank you for that referral. Our last question, question number 6: Please tell me about your first job.
After I graduated from high school, before I went to college, I worked as a caregiver for a 90-year-old woman. Who was wheelchair-bound, and I helped her empty bedpans, did her clothes, did her laundry, moved her from the bed to the chair, everything that was needed. And that was a huge wake-up call for me, and it really kind of set my standard as to what it means to have a work ethic and to work for something, even though the pay may not equal the job, but you're offering a service.
And the person who you were serving appreciated you, I assume?
Well, actually, she was kind of grinchy, but it gave me the reason to learn that even if the person who's receiving the service, that there's rewards beyond that. Even if they are not appreciative, you can still be happy for your service because the happiness comes from within.
Hearing you right?
That's it.
Absolutely. Well, Mary, thank you so much for being on the show. How could people find you?
Oh, that's easy. Just my website. Everything is on my website. The link to my podcast, the link to my Marco Polo channel where I talk about being fit and fabulous after 50, things about my book, where I'm speaking. So that is marycraftsinc.com. Mary, M-A-R-Y Crafts, C-R-A-F-T-S, Inc., I-N-C, dot com. Come see me.
Perfect. This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast. For more insights and ideas, please go to LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook, or iTunes and search for the Winning at Business and Life podcast. Thanks for listening.
