Meet Susan & Taiyler

We had the good fortune of connecting with Susan & Taiyler and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Susan & Taiyler, is there something that you feel is most responsible for your success?
The most important factor behind the success of Sides of Aloha would be our family. Without them, Sides of Aloha wouldn’t exist. My mom spent years perfecting the recipe for Malasadas to have them be the fluffy, airy, light clouds of heaven they are today. My little siblings, my dad and my husband have been nothing but supportive of my mom and I the entire journey.

We also wouldn’t be where we are now if it wasn’t for the constant support of the Hawaiian community in Colorado. We first started as a cottage law business selling Malasadas from home. People would drive from Pueblo, Denver, and as far as Wyoming to come to our house in Colorado Springs for a taste of home. Food always brings people together.

It was to the point where there would be a line outside our door all the way down to the driveway, which is when we decided it was time to either get a brick and mortar place or a food truck, which is where we are today with our food truck

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Not a lot of people realize how much work, time, and effort goes into having a food truck and being the only ones working it.

There’s a lot of things we didn’t think about before starting our food truck career that we have been learning along the way.

When you’re working as two, you’re in charge of everything from coming up with products, buying ingredients, taking photos, promoting and marketing, scheduling and planning, cleaning and organizing, etc and it’s definitely a lot more than we realized. When we first started, we just chose the “jobs/roles” we knew would be easier for us to do and divided them that way and it’s worked out thus far!

One thing we love about having a food truck is being able to travel throughout the state of Colorado and always getting to meet new people. Over the years, we’ve had “regulars” that would come over to the house to pickup Malasadas and they’ve followed us through our food truck journey. Since getting our food truck, we’ve also had the pleasure of meeting the most amazing, kind hearted people and we LOVE seeing them when they stop by

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
Colorado Springs has a lot of unique places to offer!

Some outdoorsy places to hike/visit would be Garden of the Gods, Ute Valley Park, Manitou Incline), Seven Falls. They’re all relatively easy to do and are definitely worth it

If you’re looking for somewhere with great views of the city there’s Siamese Twins at Garden of the Gods, Lumen8 Rooftop, Pulpit Rock, Gold Camp Rd.

Great places for food would be Rabbit Hole, Ristorante Di Sopra, Tumeric Indian Food, Ristorante Del Lago, Mayjah Grinds.

There are a good number of speakeasies that I love going to for some drinks! Allusion would have to be top on the list, every three months they change the theme of the bar and they get really creative. They have two different locations and both are two different parts/ideas of the theme. They’ve done Alice in Wonderland, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Super Mario Bros, Barbie, Friends and more themes to come! Other really good speakeasy Shame & Regret or District Elleven

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Thanks to my mom, Susan, for pushing us to get the food truck and spending all those years and all that energy trying out different recipes

Huge mahalo to the Hawaiians in Colorado group on Facebook for the continued support and spreading the word of a little taste of home being in Colorado

Website: https://sidesofaloha.weebly.com/?

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sidesofaloha?igsh=MWJhOWhvNjdxdG9xeg==

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SidesOfAloha?mibextid=LQQJ4d