Hi, Bombs Squad. This is Carrie Diamond, host of Radio Cherry Bomb

Magazine and editor-in-chief of Cherry Bomb magazine. Welcome to our new series, Follow the Leader.

These days, everyone is hungry for more advice, especially about being an entrepreneur

or finding smarter ways to run a business. For this series, we're talking to four women at

different stages of their careers about how they handle key aspects of their business.

Today, we'll be talking about culture. And no, we don't mean the yogurt kind.

When it comes to building your business, it's important to consider how to create a community

and an ethos that speaks to both your employees and your customers. That's why I'm talking

with Diana Dowhung of Blackseed bagels about how she's worked to create a culture from day one when she had just a few

employees and one location to today with more than 100 employees across seven locations.

Let's thank Uber Eats for supporting this series. And now my interview with Diana Dowhung.

So we're here to talk about culture, not the yogurt kind or the, you know, kombucha kind,

all that, but what it means to have a company culture.

So blackseeds been open now for five years, right? Yep.

Yeah, five years going on six very shortly. Five going on six. It feels like Black Seed has been around longer because you opened and you just start crushing it immediately. I mean, you change

the bagel scene in New York, which is not an easy thing to do because the places that have been

around are institutions.

And now Black Seed is an institution. How does that feel? It's insane to think that we have

seven locations now in five years. Like you said, to you, it seems like to me, I feel like I've been

doing it for a lifetime. It's insane. Oh, I feel like it's been around forever.

Right.

Yeah.

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