Friends of Tabletop: Meet Laura Brummett from Triangle Business Journal
Friends of Tabletop is a place where we share who we love working with. This can range from a client, influencer/blogger, or special someone who simply means a lot to the Tabletop Team. Colleagues and friends who we’ve met throughout our journey with Tabletop Media Group make us a part of who we are.
For our March Friends of Tabletop, meet Laura Brummett from Triangle Business Journal!
Photo by Mehmet Demirci
Tell us about being a Staff Writer at Triangle Business Journal.
I cover retail, restaurants, hospitality, professional services and mergers & acquisitions. I’m one of five reporters at TBJ, and I write a mix of breaking news stories, in-depth reports and longform pieces related to my beat. I do a lot of networking and relationship building in the Raleigh business community (and beyond) to ensure thorough and timely stories. (Feel free to reach out anytime!)
Why did you want to become a journalist?
I first decided to become a journalist when I was in middle school by watching ESPN reporter Erin Andrews. I grew up watching sports with my dad and was mesmerized by Erin’s confidence. My high school didn’t have a newspaper or any journalism classes, so it wasn’t until my junior year that I actually learned what journalism was. My mom was childhood friends with one of the editors of the News & Observer at the time, and he let me come to the newsroom and shadow him and several reporters for the day. When I was sitting in on their morning news meeting, I knew that’s what I wanted to do.
Photo by Taylor Davenport Dillon
What are you currently reading?
I’m currently reading The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid (though I read news articles daily).
What is one of your unpopular opinions?
Winter is better than summer, the mountains are better than the beach, cake really isn’t that good, cats are better than dogs — that’s probably enough.
What is your least favorite food?
People have least favorite foods?
What about favorite food?
If I had to pick, I’d have to say Southern food. But Asian, Italian, French food too — all food is good. Maybe this is why I’m a restaurant reporter.
What is your favorite ice cream order?
Okay this could have been under the unpopular opinion question, but sweets aren’t really my thing. If I do get ice cream, it’ll be some type of sherbet or sorbet.
What do you do in your free time?
The North Carolina Museum of Art is my favorite place in the world. I also like yoga, painting, reading, watching Rupaul’s Drag Race and drinking pretty cocktails at local spots with my friends.
If you could redo one thing in regard to your journalist career what would it be?
That’s hard to say because it took a lot of hard work to get to where I am, but if I could have found a way to avoid ever working for free, that would have been great. Two places I worked early in my career didn’t pay me.
What's the most useful lesson you've learned from being a journalist?
Talking to so many people about many different topics over the years has shown me the true depth of how different human beings are from each other, and how valuable those varying perspectives are. Also, that the oxford comma is the devil.