Jeff Thomas

I started a small catering company in 1985 after graduating with a BBA from UC and an MBA from NKU. Jeff Thomas Catering has now grown to a $2,000,000 plus a year business with 12 full time employees and an average of 80 part time employees. I currently serve on the board of The Children’s Home of Northern Kentucky. Past boards served include Caracole , The Carnegie, and Friends of CCM. I’m known in the community for my charitable “in kind” contributions to our non profit organizations which makes me feel good to supply support to help those in need. Having started my company when I was 27, I’m now 63 and plan to continue with my passion until the age of 70. At that time, I will write my book, “Confessions and Capers of a Caterer “. This will be essays around the crazy things that happened in my catering career.

Please tell us a little bit about your family.
Partnered with Kent Shaw for ten plus years, we enjoy spending time with our grandson, Owen Lansing Shaw

Please tell us about your current, past, or future career. What do you love most about what you do?
As a caterer, I love the involvement in community, the creative outlet and keeping up with the ever changing face of food and events.

What are a couple of your favorite restaurants in our community?
I love Walt’s Hitching Post in Northern Kentucky, Boca, Sotto and Abigail Street.

How long have you lived or worked in our community?
Raised in Northern Kentucky and lived most of my adult life in Ohio, now celebrating 35 years of business.

Who is the most interesting person you’ve met here in our community?
The most interesting person I’ve met in our community is Art’s Philanthropist David Herriman who we lost a couple years ago. From the age of 27 and the start of my business, he remained a very close friend and mentor.

If you could travel anywhere in the world right now, where would it be and why?
Except for this year, my partner and I travel three international trips a year. One place that we always visit in the summer is a quaint little beach town just 30 miles south of Barcelona called Sitges. We have certainly missed being there this year.

What is one of your favorite movies? TV shows?
One of my favorite movies is “Far from Heaven “. It stars Dennis Quaid and Julianne Moore. Set in the late 1950’s, it brilliantly faces the challenges of prejudice including homosexuality, black vs. white and male vs. female. Very compelling.

What advice would you give to people?
Give with no expectation of getting back. It will come back to you ten fold. This is a strong belief of Judaism.

What is something on your bucket list?
Having traveled the world, I encountered my number one bucket list last February, a cruise leaving Papeete Tahiti and circling the South Pacific with an overnight in Bora Bora where we stayed in one of those huts on the water with the glass floor.

What is your go to band when you cant decide what to listen to?
It’s a tie between Basia and Sade

What current or former local business makes you the most nostalgic about our community?
Walt’s Hitching Post. I’ve been going there since I was 5 years old and my parents had a house charge before credit cards!

If you could choose anyone that is alive today and not a relative; with whom would you love to have lunch? Why? And where locally would y’all meet for this lunch?
It would be Paul McCartney because his life changed so many times throughout his career. I want to know what he thought and how he accepted fame. I’d have this lunch at The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum.

What is your favorite thing or something unique about our community?
The typography of the city with so many different views from the 7 hills looking down on the city and the river.

Where do you see yourself in 5 to 10 years?
Retired with a second home probably in Fort Lauderdale.

What is something interesting that most people don’t know about you?
I used to be able to play Rhapsody in Blue on the piano. I couldn’t play Mary had a Little Lamb now!

What is the most beautiful place you have ever been?
That’s a tie between Lucerne Switzerland and Sutzburg Austria.

What is your favorite month? favorite holiday? and best single day on the calendar?
June, Thanksgiving and June 4, (my birthday)

What would you rate a 10 out of 10?
President Obama.

Who inspires you to be better?
My eighth grade teacher, Alice Sharp. She took me aside and said, “why are you messing up so bad? You have so much potential”. Because someone believed in me and told me so, I did a one eighty and went on to achieve an MBA.

What is one or two of your favorite smells?
Christmas greens and gardenias

Finally, what 3 words or phrases come to mind when you think of the word HOME?
Comfort, safe, secure.