Denyelle Bruno is the CEO of Tender Greens, a quickly-growing, chef-led kitchen with 28 locations throughout California, New York, and Boston. It also happens to be one of Newsette HQ’s favorite restaurants, given its affordable whole food offerings. Denyelle recently became the company’s CEO, and is a perfect fit for the role, considering her expertise in turning great ideas into iconic brands. Her resume is impressive, including Drybar (where as President of Retail Operations she opened 55 locations in three years) and Apple (where she was one of seven people working alongside Steve Jobs to open the first 25 Apple stores). Talk about inspiring. When this groundbreaker isn’t leading Tender Greens’ nationwide expansion, she lives in Silver Lake with her partner and twin boys, enjoying urban hikes, great food, and karaoke. Below, Denyelle shares the routine that helps her get ready to conquer a busy day.
6 A.M. I’m up at this time every morning because that’s when my son wakes up. He’s like clockwork and he usually wakes me by doing something charming, like jumping on my stomach.
6:15 A.M. I get up and let the dogs out. I have two Shiba Inus, Coco and Bowie. I then make Peet’s coffee for my wife and I. I get the kids each a glass of Horizon organic, whole milk. We all sit on our king, Casper bed and the kids watch either Paw Patrol or Daniel Tiger. I sit on my phone and check the news, scroll through Instagram, read email and play video games. I’ll usually play one video game over and over until I can’t stand the sight of it.
6:45 A.M. I put on my Adidas running shoes, any old shorts and t-shirt, a bandana and my wireless Beats Headphones. I’ll listen to podcasts while I run around the Silver Lake Reservoir. I am a bit of a podcast junkie. I listen to Tim Ferris, TED Talks, This American Life, James Altucher, Hidden Brain, Freakanomics Radio, The goop and Radio Lab, just to name a few.
7:45 A.M. I get home from my run and I’ll drink either a glass of organic grapefruit juice or a glass of Organifi Red Juice. Then I make myself two, pasture-raised eggs over easy and smother them with more Cholula than most humans can stomach. I’ll usually make my kids scrambled eggs.
8 A.M. Take a quick shower and get ready for work. I wash my face with Cetaphil and Dermalogica Daily Microfoliant. I don’t wear much makeup and I dress pretty casually, but I do spend time on my hair. I use Drybar’s Southern Belle Volumizing Mousse and The Warden Hairspray.
8:30 A.M. If I’m headed into the office, which is most days, I have the good fortune of having a short commute. I work downtown, which is 4 miles from my house, sometimes I even walk. When I drive to work I either listen to NPR or to Kevin and Bean on KROQ. I’ve listened to them off and on for 30 years and they still sound the same, which I suspect means they are vampires.
9 A.M. I get to work, grab more coffee and immediately jump into conversations with anyone who’s interested in talking. I don’t have an agenda, I just like finding out what people find worthy of discussing first thing at work. Often, it’s about whatever song is playing in the office or some hot news topic. It’s also the time when someone on the team usually rushes in with a great idea from the night before.
9:30 A.M. By this time, I’m probably in a meeting. I’m not good at keeping meeting times though… if one meeting is extremely interesting and productive, then we’ll keep going even if we’re done hours later. Sometimes this means I miss meetings that follow. I know this could be annoying, but I don’t like when a good flow gets interrupted. I’ve also been known to cut a meeting down to 5 mins if it doesn’t seem like it’s the best use of everyone’s time. I think schedules should be more like placeholders because you can’t anticipate inspiration or great ideas. The rest of the day is really just a continuation of that. I prefer face-to-face meetings and texting. I reserve emails for the very beginning and very end of the day.