When Nicole Kalloo dis­cov­ered she was be­ing over­charged by the elec­tri­cians hired to build-out her bak­ery, she did not sim­ply suc­cumb to the frus­tra­tion of the mo­ment or set­tle for a fi­nan­cial loss.

In­stead, she chose to trans­form her in­dig­na­tion in­to a pow­er­ful mis­sion for self-re­liance and pro­fes­sion­al mas­tery.

Dri­ven by a per­va­sive lack of trans­paren­cy with­in the lo­cal con­tract­ing in­dus­try, Kalloo, a pas­try chef, com­mit­ted her­self to learn­ing the trade from the ground up to en­sure her busi­ness in­ter­ests and her fi­nances would nev­er be com­pro­mised by preda­to­ry prac­tices again.