No sour grapes for new catering website operators

This time around Donna and Ron Rominiecki are running the show.

Well, for the most part.

For the last seven years, the couple managed the Richmond affiliate of Vmeals, which runs a website that matches caterers with corporate clients who place lots of catering orders.

They weren’t franchisees exactly, but the couple invested around $400,000 over the years to run the Richmond and Hampton Roads markets for the catering company. And business was good, with 50 restaurants and caterers serving business customers like pharmaceutical representatives and law firms.

But then Vmeals, which is based in Charlottesville, ran into financing troubles, according to Donna Rominiecki. The Midlothian-based company didn’t pay the couple three months of revenues. (The Rominieckis were licensees and not franchisees, and thus did not handle the money themselves, Rominiecki said).

Carter Hoerr, the president and CEO at Vmeals, declined to comment. But another source familiar with the company and the Rominieckis corroborated their story.

“They (Vmeals) were not able to pay their debt, so the creditor foreclosed on the company,” said Donna Rominiecki.

“They rejected our licenses and left us out to dry.”

Vmeals still has a Richmond location, but is now operated by the company itself.

So the Rominieckis brainstormed with other spurned licensees around the country and formed a new company – Snapfinger Catering.

Snapfinger Catering launched in October and the Rominiekis run the Richmond/Fredericksburg/Hampton Roads markets. Snapfinger also has affiliates in Detroit, Northern Virginia/D.C./Maryland, Orlando and Raleigh. And all together the former Vmeals licensees invested $125,000 into the new endeavor. Together the group is splitting startup costs like the new website and marketing materials.

And they’re not exactly starting from scratch. Snapfinger is already one of the largest restaurant ordering sites on the web, Donna said. The site allows consumers to find and order carryout food over the web. Her group is adding the catering side, which is meant to appeal to businesses and not to single customers looking to place an order for lunch takeout, for example.

The business model is similar to that at Vmeals: help office administrators and those who have to order lots of catering by offering a one-stop website for the local options, charge the same as those restaurants charge, and then collect a fee from the participating restaurants and caterers.

The site allows customers in downtown Richmond (zip code 23220) to order from 17locales, including Moe’s Southwest Grill, HoneyBaked Ham Company & Cafe, and Coppola’s Deli, to name a few. You can see the full list here.

The average order size is around $200, Rominiecki said.

Snapfinger Catering is studying potential expansion plans, Rominiecki said.

Aaron Kremer is the BizSense editor. Please send news tips to Editor@richmondbizsense.com.