On this episode of Eating While Broke, host Coline Witt sits down with entrepreneur Pinky Cole—founder of Slutty Vegan—for an honest conversation about money, mindset, and rebuilding after major setbacks. Over a homemade **Tofurky sandwich**, Pinky breaks down vegan label-reading, food costs, and why she stopped eating meat in 2007.

Pinky shares her upbringing in a Jamaican family, her father’s 22-year imprisonment, and how early exposure to her mother’s music career shaped her ambition. She recounts hustling as a teen party promoter, working in TV production (including Maury), and opening a Harlem Jamaican restaurant that later burned down without fire insurance. She explains how that loss—and other setbacks—ultimately led to new opportunities, including launching **Slutty Vegan** in Atlanta.

She also discusses Slutty Vegan’s rapid rise, later restructuring, personal bankruptcy, $20M in debt, and the lessons she learned about transactional relationships, team alignment, and ego. 

On this episode of Eating While Broke, host Coline Witt sits down with entrepreneur Pinky Cole&mdash;founder of Slutty Vegan&mdash;for an honest conversation about money, mindset, and rebuilding after major setbacks. Over a homemade **Tofurky sandwich**, Pinky breaks down vegan label-reading, food costs, and why she stopped eating meat in 2007.
Pinky shares her upbringing in a Jamaican family, her father&rsquo;s 22-year imprisonment, and how early exposure to her mother&rsquo;s music career shaped her ambition. She recounts hustling as a teen party promoter, working in TV production (including Maury), and opening a Harlem Jamaican restaurant that later burned down without fire insurance. She explains how that loss&mdash;and other setbacks&mdash;ultimately led to new opportunities, including launching **Slutty Vegan** in Atlanta.
She also discusses Slutty Vegan&rsquo;s rapid rise, later restructuring, personal bankruptcy, $20M in debt, and the lessons she learned about transactional relationships, team alignment, and ego.&nbsp;

Hosted by media maven Coline Witt, ‘Eating While Broke’ podcast is a new interview series centered around self-made celebrities, influencers, disruptors and entrepreneurs eating meals they once ate when they were broke. Episodes will also feature guest who are in the mood to recreate some of their favorite low cost meals. EWB guest will introduce the dish, as the dish is revealed to the host, before the chow down begins, while discussing life, some of the their most pivotal moments and more. In this intimate setting the interview begins with a journey of tales from the trenches not matter if you're Eating While Broke or Eating While on a Budget.

Eating While Broke

PINKY COLE - A Sandwich, a Setback, and a Second Empire

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/2b796a28-5fde-4581-b8af-b496013ed1b7/transcript