My Dad took me to Souplantation for the first time. I was in college. My brother and I were visiting him for the weekend and he suggested it. We went and I was in heaven. Any restaurant that has a huge spread of carbs that I can re-fill at will is my kind of place! Back then, the wait staff would bring around brown paper bags at closing and let patrons take home the muffins left at the bar.
Anytime we went to visit my dad after that, we'd always ask for Souplantation and wait until just before closing to go. One time, we went the night before we were to leave on a road trip to Vegas. My brother and I made a bee line for the muffin bar and stuffed those bags as full as we could. We ate muffins all the way to Vegas and back.
One semester in college, I scheduled a three hour break in my Tuesday, Thursday classes. I'd take my books to Souplantation right before the pricing changed from lunch to dinner and I'd study for hours grazing on sourdough, pasta and fro yo. Looking back, the fact that I gained a ton of weight should not have come as any surprise. But, I did get good grades that semester.
Fast forward to Tyler's toddlerhood. We decided to take him to Souplantation to see what kind of veggies he'd like. It was the perfect place to spread a lot of little piles of food in front of him and let him go to town. Today, when I tell him he used to happily and willingly eat beets, he looks at me as though I've grown an extra limb. Souplantation is still his favorite restaurant.
To this day his plate looks almost the same as it did when he was little: noodles, kidney beans, peas, corn, shredded cheese, pizza foccacia, sourdough and blueberry muffins. Lather, rinse and repeat. The last time we went to dinner, he did express slight interest in my baked potato with bacon, cheese and chicken* but I'm not holding my breath.
Where's all this going? Well, it's just a lot of backstory to help you understand why I was so psyched when I got an invitation to meet some of the execs from Souplantation a few weeks ago. All week leading up to the event, Tyler kept telling me how lucky I was. "You're spending three whole days there? You're so lucky! I wish I was going, too. Can you bring me back some noodles?"
I've said before that one of the best things about blogging has been getting to meet to execs from companies I admire and having them listen to our ideas, share their visions and ask if there are ways we can help them achieve them. I made a few suggestions as to how they could honor our men and women in uniform and make school fundraising a little easier. Add to that one of the contacts I made has asked for my help with their social media and it was a win all the way around.
People often ask me what the benefit is to attending a blogging event. I never know what I'm going to get out of an event until I go. I have no idea if I'll write about events I attend until they're over and I can find a way to weave something personal in that will (hopefully) make it interesting for you to read about.
In this case, how could I pass up the opportunity to meet the people behind a company I've loved since I was a teenager?
What about you? What do you get out of blogging events? Is there a company or brand you'd love the opportunity to get to meet with?
*They'll probably get mad at me for telling you this, but instead of buying the side of chicken meat at the salad bar, I take some of the chunks out the chicken noodle soup.
This is not a compensated post though Souplantation fed me well for the three days of the event. Caryn of Rockin' Mama has a little bit of video of the event and I have a few pictures on Flickr.