Before that she served as vice president of operations and sales at Bon Appetit Management Co., and got her start in marketing with USA Hosts as director of sales. She holds a degree in communications and broadcasting from San Francisco State University. D.C. Robert Kinkead Jr. is on a mission. He wants consumers, whose palates he believes have been numbed by excessive exposure to chain-concept fare, to rediscover the joy of dining in independent restaurants. They reflect the identity of the country's regions, cities, towns, and people through the food they serve.
Chains are about money.
As the group's president, he travels around the country as CIRA's representative to meet with independent operators in targeted cities such as Atlanta, Milwaukee and Seattle and to discuss issues specific to their areas. Kinkead's ties to the independent tradition go back to his high school and college days when he worked in restaurants in his native New England. D.C. In 1993, Kinkead opened his namesake restaurant in the nation's capital. Good food is his passion, but he also knows that a restaurant is a business, not just a labor of love. And business knowledge is one area where owners of independents often fall short, says Kinkead.