Tasteful Treats & Treasures, Banksville
Some people start a home-based business searching the Internet for tips on how to launch their ideas. When Rose Colonna was toying with the notion of creating a new business, she found inspiration in a book called, “How to Start a Home-Based Gift Basket Business.”
Thirteen years later, Tasteful Treats & Treasures is among the top 100 gifting companies in the United States. Along with her daughter, Jennifer Colonna, the company’s director of sales and marketing, and two other women, Colonna has built a business that caters to individual clients and a growing number of corporate customers across the Unites States and around the world.
With 10 years of previous experience in the intimate apparel business in addition to her background as an advertising and sales director for several New York City companies, Colonna was well-versed to step into the gifting industry.
“My mom is extremely talented and creative,” Jennifer Colonna said. “I could envisage that anything she puts her mind to would work out.”
After earning a business and marketing degree, Jennifer Colonna decided to join her mother’s growing business. She describes their relationship as the “yin to my yang,” which allows them to “complement each other really well,” she said.
The mother-daughter duo, along with production manager Sue Cecchetelli and Heidi Lewis, the company’s visual director, search for ideas at various trade shows, although Jennifer Colonna admits they get gift ideas from just about anywhere.
The company, which employs four to eight part-time workers, offers an array of gift basket options for all occasions, including gourmet food and wine baskets, holiday gift baskets, corporate gifts and promotional products, in addition to balloons, banners and a gift-wrapping and ribbon imprinting service.
While she initially focused on individual consumers, Colonna quickly realized there was more potential serving corporate clients. Today, that comprises about 95 percent of her business, which she operates through a corporate gifts program, allowing companies to order multiple gift baskets at once.
Tasteful Treats & Treasures, a 2015 Westchester Magazine Best of Westchester winner, maintains accounts with clients from a variety of industries, including financial institutions, healthcare companies and the hotel industry, to name a few.
Tasteful Treats & Treasures, considered one of the fastest growing companies of its kind in the U.S. by Gift Basket Review, also offers baskets that include a number of licensed sports items. The company also ships NCAA gift baskets bearing the names of universities and colleges from across the country as well as Major League Baseball and NFL themed gift baskets.
What makes Tasteful Treats & Treasures unique, Jennifer Colonna explained, is that everything is made to order.
“You can mix and match; we literally take everything off the shelves as the orders come in,” she said.
Rose Colonna envisions the company expanding beyond its current Banksville location to a bigger, more visible headquarters.
“Right now we’re bulging because we are getting deliveries on a daily basis,” she said, referring to the approaching holiday season and the need to constantly replenish the company’s stock to accommodate the changing seasons.
Despite the hard work and commitment it takes to run the business, Colonna said it’s been a great experience. The company’s team always has time to have lunch and dinner, and sometimes a “midnight snack,” she joked.
“It’s a labor of love for us,” said Jennifer Colonna. “But the work is not difficult because we really enjoy what we do, and it makes us happy knowing that we are exceeding customers’ expectations.”
To purchase a gift basket or learn more about gifts available at Tasteful Treats & Treasures, call 800-425-9226, visit www.tastefultreats.com or e-mail info@TastefulTreats.com.
Colette Connolly is a copywriter and p.r. expert. She owns Connolly Communications, which is based in Bronxville, New York. Colette specializes in providing content-rich, SEO-optimized press releases, articles, newsletters, brochures, and customer success stories.
