Dame Sheri Wetherall
Not so long ago, clicking a keyboard to find recipes to inspire dinner and dessert was new and fascinating. When one of your passions is food, as it was and still is for innovator, entrepreneur, and Member Sheri Wetherell, co-founding a food website and hosting special conferences for food bloggers were super exciting. Stints at Amazon and eBay in San Francisco prepared her, and, in December 2008, after a move to Seattle, Dame Sheri with her husband Barnaby Dorfman co-founded and launched Foodista. Their concept was a community site for food fans with a database of information about food, cooking tools, and techniques, along with recipes contributed by users and special guest writers.
“We wanted Foodista.com to be the online cooking encyclopedia everyone could edit, Wikipedia-style,” says Sheri. “It might have been too early technology-wise though, because people didn’t like having their recipes messed with, so the site evolved to offer different versions of iconic recipes.”
Friends and engineers helped set up and launch the Foodista site, and yes, since Sheri and Barnaby had previously worked at Amazon building its Marketplace pages, Amazon was an early investor, along with friends and family. Today, Sheri is the driver and social media maven for the site, which has evolved to keep up with algorithm changes and challenges. It’s still a top destination for finding recipes, reading blog posts, watching videos and podcasts, and more.
Back then was also primetime for bloggers. Attending a BlogHer conference in San Francisco inspired her second business idea. Finding no events targeting food bloggers, in 2009, she and Barnaby hosted the first International Food Bloggers Conference (IFBC) in a charming event space in West Seattle. An event planner, for Sheri planning events was easy as pie. Enthusiasm for the speakers and from the camaraderie among attendees bounced off the walls at their first event. “We wanted the conference to have a higher-end boutique feel,” she recalls, “to keep it authentic and special.”
Everyone demanded another conference, so IFBC events continued successfully in several locations, from Seattle and New Orleans to Sacramento, beginning in 2010 in partnership with Zephyr Conferences. In 2017, IFBC was sold to Zephyr for exclusive management rights with the group continuing to host annual conferences until this year’s COVID-19 outbreak.
Dame Sheri credits her grandmothers with instilling her passion for cooking. Her paternal grandmother owned a diner in San Francisco, while her mom’s mother lived on 100 acres in Sonoma, California. “From an early age, I smelled fresh bread baking in her kitchen and I also loved exploring her vast garden,” she remembers. “Cooking has always been a stress reliever for me.”
Count travel as another of Dame Sheri’s passions, which she sees as “a bridge to food and culture.” Growing up in Sun River, Oregon, might seem to guarantee a small-town perspective, but when your dad is an airline pilot, the world is your oyster. Childhood trips to New York, London, Paris, and other destinations prompted a college study-abroad year in Italy, and then, three years teaching in an ESL program in Japan and discovering the country’s fascinating culture and foodways during her first marriage. Shari’s favorite destination when arriving in a new place? No surprises here. It’s the nearest market to explore local foods and wines. Sounds like a recipe for success!
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