How a caterer kept her business alive by switching from doing weddings to doorstep delivery

Jaleesa Tahapary and her brother Arèn started their own catering company 'Smoking Buddha' in June 2019. The siblings were running a thriving and successful business, creating culinary concepts for weddings, parties and events. However, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the Netherlands and restrictions came into place, they were suddenly forced to change their whole strategy and way of working and begin a full-scale digital transformation.

Jaleesa and Arèn started by adding BBQ-packages and three-course food menus for takeaway and delivery to their existing offering. And since their core target audience had shifted from solely business customers to include consumers, Smoking Buddha had to revise their online marketing strategy too.

To support their digital transformation, Smoking Buddha signed up for Google's Digitale Werkplaats workshops and one-on-one coaching with a Google Digitale Werkplaats trainer. This enabled them to optimise their GMB account, start employing Google Analytics, create more content, improve their overall online marketing strategy, and attract at least 75% more monthly web visitors. In addition, Smoking Buddha also created a webshop (for food delivery and takeaway) and added this to their website, which led to increased revenue (+250%).

This year, their goal is to focus more on harnessing their social media channels to increase awareness of their catering business and deliver food to other regions across the Netherlands.