Dayum That is My Jam proprietor now makes jam complete time

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The landlord of an 8-year-old jam corporate is jumping into the enterprise complete time after years of rising it as a small enterprise whilst maintaining down place of job jobs. The playfully branded corporate is encouraged via decades-old circle of relatives recipes and a undertaking to attach LGBTQ and underrepresented other folks and companies.

Dayum That is My Jam – shortened to Dayum Jam – was once created via Andy Waller in 2015. The corporate’s recipes come from a hand-stitched cookbook handed down thru 5 generations in their longtime good friend and co-founder Lindsey Larkin’s circle of relatives. Just like its moniker, Dayum Jam’s merchandise are titled with vigorous wordplay in accordance with standard song from a number of generations.

Child Were given Blackberry was once the primary jam the corporate named and created, impressed via Sir Combine-a-Lot’s 1992 hit tune. Different song-branded jams come with Bohemian Raspberry, Strawberry Zeal Endlessly and Scorching for Peaches.

“Our longest-running tagline for the enterprise is ‘Open a Jar and Jam out,’ ” Waller mentioned. “We’re the usage of excellent packaging, a a laugh emblem and a undertaking that’s rooted into the neighborhood to push other folks to our merchandise, reasonably than simply getting a regular jar.”

Dayum Jam additionally sells different pieces, equivalent to pickles, salsa and a pancake combine, entire with in a similar fashion vigorous names, together with Psycho Diller and Livin’ L. a. Vida Verda. The corporate’s on-line ordering platform lets in customers to pay on a sliding scale, with possible choices from $8 to $10 for a product indexed at $9.

It simply added a weekly provider, The Weekly Jam, the place shoppers can order Dayum Jam pieces along merchandise from different small native companies in Waller’s community, and feature them delivered.

Waller is queer, transgender and nonbinary. A few of their earlier tasks have garnered a following a number of the native LGBTQ neighborhood. Waller based Secure Area Marketplace, a neighborhood of greater than 50 small companies with an emphasis on LGBTQ and different marginalized house owners.

That have has segued into Dayum Jam’s latest segment of the corporate, TransJam occasions. The occasions provider is making plans and website hosting inclusive native occasions, events and personal workshops. Its moment tournament in November was once “Dragstravaganza,” which drew round 300 youngsters for tale time, drag performances and video games at Variety Richmond.

“TransJam is rad; it’s tremendous new. The gist of it’s combining Dayum Jam and my visibility with the paintings that I do and furthering my love and connection to small underrepresented companies.”

The occasions facet of the enterprise remains to be relatively new, however its jams and pickles took off in 2021. Gross sales grew from $61,000 to $101,000, sufficient to influence Waller to leap in complete time at the same time as their spouse stepped clear of the body of workers to deal with their youngsters.

“Earlier than that, I used to be juggling operating a small enterprise with a full-time task. In 2020, I made massive efforts to extend gross sales because of the pandemic, my spouse leaving her task … and my turning into our sole breadwinner,” Waller mentioned.

Developing their very own paintings setting

Waller’s choice got here after greater than a decade spent running in place of job jobs the place they mentioned they struggled to really feel authorized as a queer and trans particular person the usage of they/them pronouns.

Waller left their task at a state company in November after running there for 4 years.

“The surroundings was once what you may be expecting from a state place of job,” Waller mentioned. “It was once very khaki, and the typical particular person was once two decades older than me. I used to be indubitably the black sheep.”

Waller, 38, known as nonbinary at the beginning of that task, however didn’t transition till a 12 months later. They began that task in a while after Virginia incorporated LGBTQ as a safe elegance in 2018.

“The ones state protections gave me the incentive and the sensation that I might be OK to transition,” Waller mentioned. “The surroundings wasn’t essentially essentially the most pleasant, however I assumed I wouldn’t be discriminated towards, or no less than other folks would face repercussions in the event that they did.”

Waller mentioned that whilst safe legally, they ended up dealing with different sorts of social isolation.

One in all their closest place of job pals, a middle-aged girl, stopped talking with them when they transitioned. Waller corrected them for regarding them via the flawed pronouns, and that worker slowly stopped speaking with them later on, Waller mentioned.

Waller additionally confronted a continuing circulation of other folks misgendering them. The place of job introduced Waller’s transition with an e-mail and despatched a reminder after persisted misgendering, Waller mentioned.

“The place of job was once supportive to start with, however that ended beautiful temporarily. It felt just like the psychological exertions was once on me from control to coach other folks,” Waller mentioned. “Don’t use the individual for coaching this is already going thru a hard existence alternate.”

Working out which rest room they must use changed into a battle. Waller would have most popular the place of job to rename the entire bogs as all-gendered areas. However the company sought after to have Waller persist with a selected rest room.

“I shouldn’t have to make use of a person’s rest room. I shouldn’t have to make use of a lady’s rest room, as a result of I’m no longer a lady. However the international doesn’t paintings that means, and I hate to mention it, however to the typical particular person, a nonbinary or all-gender bogs is sort of a large ask,” Waller mentioned.

Waller mentioned they confronted difficulties over their queer and nonbinary identification in 3 place of job positions sooner than their final and ultimate one.

“This stuff weren’t as egregious in comparison to what the typical particular person can have a look at and acknowledge. If you’re taking all of it in combination, and it was once task after task, it’s laborious to care for,” Waller mentioned. “There are a large number of queer individuals who will simply put their head down and say they don’t care about it. I’m simply no longer that form of particular person.”

Struggling with thru a clumsy enlargement section

Now, Waller is taking up extra of the corporate’s purposes since going complete time. Dayum Jam is operating with two jam cooks, an occasions particular person and a bookkeeper whilst pushing its means thru a difficult duration in its enlargement.

Dayum Jam began out the usage of simply 10 kilos of fruit for 2 cooking classes in 2015. Now, it makes use of from 50 to 60 kilos of fruit in keeping with day. One consultation’s batch of 24 8-ounce jars has became six to seven batches.

“And we’re no longer even maintaining with orders,” Waller mentioned.

Dayum Jam was once to begin with sufficiently small to retailer the fruit in one freezer or even had some leftover for iciness when one of the end result had been out of season.

“We make means an excessive amount of now,” Waller mentioned. “I’ve 3 freezers; they’re massive, and it’s nonetheless no longer sufficient.”

The corporate – which matches out of a industrial kitchen with the Lakeside Farmers’ Marketplace in Henrico County – may be dealing with some small-business rising pains on the subject of sourcing a few of its end result, Waller mentioned.

“I’m on this bizarre grey house. For a large number of farmers, 100 kilos of strawberries is so much to provide, while for an enormous company provider, my enterprise is peanuts. Preferably, I’d like to paintings immediately with a neighborhood farmer, however that’s in flux.”

Dayum Jam works with a countrywide provider that connects companies to small farms specializing in the end result they want.

“At the moment, that’s the ache level we’re at,” Waller mentioned. “Slinging jams is a large number of paintings.”

The occasions facet of the enterprise completed 2022 with a few occasions. It now has two extra scheduled for February. One contains an artwork marketplace with a distinct speaker, a trans creator and cartoonist; the opposite is a moment Dragstravaganza at Variety Richmond with neighborhood artwork, LGBTQ makers marketplace, performances and extra.