Buzzy restaurateur Pinky Cole says she owes a lot of her success to the secrets she learned as a producer on the Maury Povich’s the “Maury Show.”
Cole was a producer on the famously lurid chat show from 2013 until 2015 before going into the food business with her Slutty Vegan brand.
“I was a producer for the ‘Maury Show’ for a long time,” she told Pvnew at the Time 100 Next event, “What I realized is you have to punch some people in the faces with the information to make them pay attention.”
Hence, it seems, her brand’s colorful name. “I combined sex and food, which are the two most pleasurable experiences and got people excited about veganism in a world where once upon a time it was not cool.”
Povich, of course, is famous for turning serious life events into game-show-like TV, including his trademark on-air paternity test reveals.
The self-made entrepreneur was honored at the Time 100 Next event for her work in educating people in under-served areas about nutrition — using, she says, another trick she learned on “Maury.”
“If I [can] get you psychologically locked, in I can educate you in whatever it is I want to educate you on,” she told us, “And that is exactly what I did with Slutty Vegan.”
The Atlanta-based vegan comfort food chain now has locations in Harlem, Brooklyn and Baltimore.
