8 Girl Bosses We Can Get Behind!
The deeper our roots run in Knoxville, the wider our reach seems to have spanned across the country over the past few years. From Tennessee to Atlanta and now, California, being a part of a family of hotels, restaurants and bars has afforded us many unique opportunities. Events, collaborations, and best of all - creating social spaces for the community run by a team from that community as well. You won’t find a dull personality or uninteresting story here. 2020 has given us a chance to reimagine, reinvent, and have a front row seat at the magic a committed team can make happen.
Today, we’re spotlighting and showcasing the amazing women that lead our various brands. Get to know them, follow them, and even better, come in and meet them yourselves. It’ll be time well spent.
The Women of the Oliver Properties
You’ll see a wide range of roles these #girlbosses fill and kick butt at and the wide-range of backgrounds and interests they bring too. Without further ado, meet our squad.
Sondra Richardson, General Manager
Oliver Royale, The Oliver Hotel, & Peter Kern Library (Knoxville, TN)
Sondra joined the Oliver Hospitality team as our General Manager to the Oliver Royale and Peter Kern Library in 2016, just 4 months after the grand opening of the restaurant. Her role evolved the most in February 2020 when she stepped into the role of General Manager of The Oliver Hotel, making her our General Manager for the entire property! And guess what? She hasn’t skipped a beat.
Sondra is known for her passion in helping people grow both professionally and personally. She leads with a focus on creating the perfect customer experience, striving to build teams known for setting the standard for excellence within the industry.
Through her twenty-plus years of hospitality service and management experience, Sondra has gained proven leadership expertise in hospitality operations, sales, and staff development, making her a valuable asset to our company nationwide.
To know Sondra is to love her. Follow her on Instagram: @sondralynne1
Claudia Martinez, Pastry Chef - Tiny Lou’s (Atlanta, GA)
Meet Executive Pastry Chef, Claudia Martinez, from our sister property in Atlanta, GA, Tiny Lou’s! This Venezuelan food enthusiast is the mastermind behind Cafe Claudia, a concept born from the global pandemic that hit the soul, finances and brick and mortar of the hospitality industry particularly hard. Claudia wanted to set aside anything that she was facing and jump in for her family in the Atlanta hospitality industry.
The goal of Cafe Claudia is to bring to the table as many creatives in the industry that she could, and give them somewhere to shine their light even bigger. So far, partnerships have included the amazing Whiskey and Rosemary, Have Some More ATL, Twelve Flour, and Dope Coffee. Cafe Claudia has many more partnerships in the works, including savory chefs with breakfast items, a taco pop-up, and more artists.
Fellow team members describe Chef Claudia as one of the kindest people with the most subtle humor who’s always willing to help out.
Follow Claudia on Instagram: @claudvictoria and Tiny Lou’s: @tinylousatl
Margaux Gamble, Server, Bartender, & On Premise Photographer
Oliver Royale (Knoxville, TN)
Margaux has been with the Oliver family since 2018 and perhaps wins the award for jack of all trades in Knoxville. Margaux was hired originally as a bartender at Oliver Royale and later cross-trained as a server. Soon after she cross-trained in our Speakeasy (Peter Kern Library) as a barback and cocktail server and also holds the role of our on premise photographer for menu changes and overall photoshoots for the general staff. (Her photos are amazing! Don’t believe us? Take a peek at our Instagram feed!)
Margaux was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest (hailing from Washington state) and is passionate about travel, street photography and life in general. She has a background in wedding photography and has photographed over 350 weddings all over the world including Portugal, Paris, Honduras, and Costa Rica.
Her passion for life shines in her a big personality that fills the room. She is generous and team oriented.
Get to know Margaux on Instagram: @margauxphoto and Oliver Royale: @oliverroyale
Casey Brooks, Assistant General Manager
Station House Inn (S Lake Tahoe, CA)
Casey Brooks is the Assistant General Manager of Oliver Hospitality’s South Lake Tahoe property, Station House Inn. When she joined the Oliver family in 2015, she brought along with her years of experience in fine dining service, management, corporate sales and marketing. Within her time with Oliver Royale, she gained the roles of Assistant General Manager, Marketing Manager and Events Coordinator. While doing so, she was also utilized to help open and train employees for future dining properties within the Oliver Hospitality family.
Casey is passionate about being in and working with nature to live as healthy as possible, traveling the country with friends to watch live music, and trying to always maintain a bright and positive spirit for everyone around her. We miss her in Knoxville and from the photos we’re receiving, she’s definitely living her best life in Lake Tahoe!
Follow Casey and her adventures on Instagram: @br00ksie85 and Station House Inn: @stationhouseinn
Grace Renshaw, Assistant General Manager
Hotel Clermont (Atlanta, GA)
Grace Renshaw is a Georgia native and has been with Hotel Clermont since 2018 after graduating from Georgia State University Business School. She started as the Assistant General Manager of Food and Beverage and is now improving our game on the hotel side as the Assistant General Manager.
Grace found her niche in fine dining and loves being able to show off what the team can do in the Tiny Lou's dining room, lobby and rooftop bars! Though she excels in guest experience, she’s a woman of many interests! Some of those include American muscle cars, her blue nose pitbull Maddux (named after Greg Maddux of course...go Braves!), and she was also a professional clogger for 10 years! Woah! You’re buckets of fun, Grace!
To follow Grace, find her on Instagram: @grace_renshaw and Hotel Clermont: @hotelclermont
Graham Harlin, Director of Brand Marketing
Fairlane Hotel (Nashville, TN)
With over 15 years of experience in sales and marketing for luxury hotels, Graham brings enthusiasm, creativity and organization to Oliver Hospitality's growing family of hotels. As the Director of Brand Marketing, Graham implements standardization to processes behind the scenes in an effort to improve customer service, drive compelling brand messaging, and most importantly grow revenue through brand awareness.
When she’s not cranking out amazing messaging and eye-opening analytics for us, she spends her time with her family (she’s a mama of 4!!), avoiding the dark - which she admits being terrified of, getting her cycling miles in (she has a big goal of riding across the country before she’s 40), and browsing food and interior design inspiration online.
Follow this powerhouse on Instagram: @grahamharlin411 and Fairlane Hotel: @thefairlanehotel
Meg Lambert, Marketing & Events Manager
Peter Kern Library (Knoxville, TN)
Meg joined the Oliver Hospitality team late 2016 as a server in Oliver Royale and since then, has held quite a few roles in our Historic Kern Building we get to call home. Meg quickly found her niche as a cocktail server in Peter Kern Library and soon after promoted to Bartender. As she was preparing for the arrival of her first baby, Meg took over as our on-site Marketing & Events Manager and those 15+ years of Hospitality experience has been rocking the marketing and events department ever since!
Meg is passionate about people, and actively participates and speaks out on topics ranging from equality to community. She is a hard worker, no matter the task put in front of her, and besides her daughter, Olivia, is also passionate about her yoga practice, teaching a donation-based class here in East Knoxville since 2016.
Follow Meg and her many bold hair colors on Instagram: @eyeshewe and Peter Kern Library: @peterkernlibrary
Leslie Payne, Hotel Concierge
The Oliver Hotel (Knoxville, TN)
Leslie has been with The Oliver Hotel since 2015, filling the roles of Housekeeper, then moving up to Housekeeping Manager, and eventually landing in her current role of Hotel Concierge. One of the things Leslie loves about her role is that it involves a little bit of everything - from Valet to marketing meetings.
Leslie is very passionate about running (as evidenced from her Instagram handle!) and all things active. When she’s not training for a race in pursuit of being a top notch athlete in running, she’s biking, hiking, camping or moving her body in some form or fashion. Leslie also loves to travel and read!
Keep up with Leslie, if you can, over on Instagram: @leslie_runs and The Oliver Hotel: @theoliverhotel