Kristen Preau has taken her childhood nickname to heart. Her early obsession with stirring jambalaya in one of her dad’s cast-iron pots—a product he welded and sold out of his New Orleans shop—earned her the moniker “Jambalaya Girl.”
“Ever since I was old enough to stand next to one of my dad’s pots, I became that little girl making jambalaya. The nickname stuck with me for years,” said Preau, who in 2010 launched a packaged food business under that same name, built on her family’s Cajun recipes.
Those recipes, her dad’s jambalaya and her mom’s gumbo, are now ready-to-cook meal mixes that evoke the flavor of a day-long simmer, but take only 30 minutes to make. Preau started small, selling cases from the back of her dad’s weld shop and delivering them in her Honda Civic. Today, Jambalaya Girl products are available in over 1,000 grocery stores across the Gulf Coast.
Preau says her Amazon storefront, which she launched in 2015, helps her share Cajun food beyond her home state. Her jambalaya mix is regularly the top-ranking product in Amazon’s packaged jambalaya category and has been shipped to all 50 states and beyond.
“Getting in the door of grocery chains nationwide is incredibly challenging and expensive,” said Preau. “Amazon gave me the ability to sell to people all over the world.”
From the beginning, Preau leaned into Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to pick, pack and ship her products, speeding up delivery times and making her products available with Prime shipping. Within two years, Jambalaya Girl became a best seller, and her Amazon sales grew about 40% year-over-year. Tools like Subscribe & Save, which lets customers automatically reorder, gave her a dependable stream of recurring revenue.
“We’ve seen growth week after week with Subscribe & Save,” she said. “My product has become part of someone’s pantry routine. That’s a big responsibility, and not one I’m going to take that for granted.”
The revenue and Amazon customer reviews she’s earned have also opened new doors. Retailers now use her Amazon sales and customer reviews as evidence of customer demand, helping her secure new opportunities. Her top-seller status has also led to write-ups in the New York Times.
As Jambalaya Girl has grown, Preau has kept production local, creating jobs in Elmwood, a suburb of New Orleans. Authenticity remains her guiding principle.
“I’m a New Orleans girl through and through,” she said. “It drives me crazy when I see a box of jambalaya made in who-knows-where, USA, and it’s nothing but cayenne and salt. That is not authentic Louisiana food.”
For Preau, running Jambalaya Girl isn’t just about selling boxed mixes; it’s about keeping a family tradition alive and using food to give back. She regularly cooks jambalaya to raise funds for schools, playgrounds, and hurricane relief efforts.
“Jambalaya is how we come together, whether it’s for a ball game, a fundraiser, or just a family dinner,” said Preau. “Amazon lets me share that little piece of New Orleans with anyone, anywhere.”