Today we’d like to introduce you to Jessica Lino.
Hi Jessica, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Where it all started, hmmm… Jessica graduated from IIN, a holistic nutrition school in 2012 and decided she wanted to get out of corporate american and do something to help people eat better and feel better. Wasn’t sure what that was going to look like at the time but the universe works in mysterious ways. Imet someone at a birthday party who worked for a local non profit company who went to the same nutrition school and she recommended i reach out to this company about taking a 16 week workshop they offered. The company is Community investment collaborative (CIC), So she did. She ended up taking the course and finding out alot about creating a business and created Farmacy in 2014, with the help of this workshop. But it is not the Farmacy you all know of now. It was a superfood smoothie subscription delivery service. Jessica would do farmers markets and worked on getting clients where she could. Like thru the restaurant, Beerrun, where she was working as a waitress. That is where she met her now husband, Gabino. After a while they wanted to create something together and happen to stumble upon a friends facebook post of a food trailer he was selling so they thought wow, what if we start a food truck together with his back of house experience and her front and back of house experience. Gabino was a cook at Beerrun and is from Mexico so they thought how about Organic Mexican Fusion food! ANd since Farmacy was already established they decided to just use that and pivot the companies direction. It took alot of remodeling to get the truck ready for work, and alot of local support, but they did it and opened the truck in August of 2018. They only could work it part time though cause they still had full time jobs in restaurants. Until March of 2020. When they lost all of their jobs. Gabino had two at the time. So they sat at their dining room table and hatched out ideas of how to generate income. They had friends reach out that were working with First responders at World Central Kitchen and started feeding them. And they starting messaging neighborhood facebook group administrators asking if they would be interested in have them come to the neighborhood for a dinner service. This went over very well. They ended up servicing 25 neighborhoods a month. this went on until covid passed, then other opportunities came about. They were approached by the people downtown that were building an office building and needed good food in their food stalls (take out kitchen). A friend of ours recommended us to them and we did a lunch service one day in the food truck to see if they would like Farmacy as one of their vendors. Lunch was a success. Farmacy Cafe was born in january 2022. It was super hard at first being that people were still working remotely and not many people were on the downtown mall anymore. But perseverance and determination are two words that Jessica and Gabino know well. We they kept on, working many many food truck events and running a small take out kitchen to stay afloat. In 2023 a friend of theirs sold them a new food truck, this one was a big boy. She was so kind to let them make monthly payments with zero interest charged. Jessica and Gabino were so excited and grateful for her kindness. They were also thrilled that they now would be able to do bigger events and would be able to function better in bigger truck. Now it is 2026 and they are still going strong, taking the food truck around the city to big concerts and festivals and doing lots of private events like weddings, UVA events, graduations, corporate events, etc.. And the best part of all their success is the people love their food! They hear it all the time how much people appreciate all their efforts to get good local, organic and healthy whole food. And love the flavors. That was Jessica’s goal from the beginning. She loves that she gets to help her community all while working side by side with her husband, whom she loves very much!
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Wrote a few of the struggles in the previous page. Like remodeling the first food truck, trying to find time to for food truck while working regular jobs, COVID, losing our jobs, struggling to stay afloat, people working remotely, etc. But there were other struggles. It was not easy to get to where we are now. There were many many times where Gabino and I had to take pay cuts just so farmacy could pay another employee or vendor. We had a to take out a loan one winter just so farmacy cafe didnt have to close. The new truck came with its own set of problems, new things we had to buy to put in there like fridges, etc. All costs money. For years the food truck carried the whole company, even the cafe. Gabino and I really poured our blood sweat and tears into it to get it to where it is. Burning the candles at both ends hoping not to burn out. It has been really hard. But the amount of love we have received from the community about our food and our mission has kept us going. And of course being supportive to each other has been a great comfort also. Gabino and i are complete opposites but compliment each other beautifully in business. His strengths are my weaknesses and visa versa.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Farmacy Food truck and Farmacy Cafe?
Farmacy (LLC) specializes in creating organic mexican fusion food. What i meant by that is, we source around 85% organic ingredients from our spices, to veggies, to masa, to beans, to rice, etc… We source local hormone free and antibiotic free chicken, pork and eggs. Our Beef is certified angus and is also hormone free and antibiotic free. All our diary like cheese and sour cream are also hormone free and antibiotic free. We use zero sugar. Zero artificial ingredients. Minimal preservatives. And make almost everything from scratch.
We make fantasticly tasty food with authentic Mexican flavors fused together with organic and super healthy ingredients. We even pur Kelp powder and Spirulina powder in our guacamole and avocado crema to give you an extra dose of nutrients that you wont even notice is there but your body much needs it. In America everyone is so nutrient deficient we need every bit we can get. We also put Megahydrate in there to give you extra hydration and antioxidants. Remember food is medicine. We all need more of that medicine in our lives. Hence the name, Farmacy. This is what sets us apart. Most people just want profit and get cheaper quality food in order to do that. We dont. Yes we want profit of course but we want to be apart of something bigger, to be a safe place for people to come and eat, knowing they will be nourished and cared for.
We are known for our bold flavors everything we do and our creative twists. Our best seller is our Super Naan Taco. But right behind it is our G’s Burrito.
Is there any advice you’d like to share with our readers who might just be starting out?
Never give up. Trust the universe and keep working! Reach out to CIC they are a great resource to have in Charlottesville, whether you want to start a business or make your current business better.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://farmacy.guru
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/farmacy.cville/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/farmacy.guru
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/farmacy-charlottesville-6
