In last week’s Inner Circle, I highlighted Amanda Hesser, the co-founder and CEO of Food52. Specifically, I covered Hesser’s tips for starting a business, which she discussed at the OPEN for Women: CEO BootCamp in New York City earlier this month.

This week, I focus on how Hesser has been able to blend content and commerce so smoothly across Food52’s eponymous content site and its e-commerce shop, Provisons. Here’s a transcript of our Q&A, which was conducted via email:

The Inner Circle: Can you tell us about Provisions, Food52’s online shop? To whom is it targeted and what’s its marketing strategy?
Amanda Hesser: Our vision for Food52 is to be the hub for all of your cooking needs. This means that if you’re having friends over for dinner, we want to be able to help you discover an excellent steak recipe and how-to tips for grilling it, show you a great cutting board for slicing it, and well-designed steak knives for serving. We launched Provisions in August 2013 as part of that mission — to bring a curated kitchen and home shopping experience to our cooking site. The site is built for people who want to eat well at home and who care about the design of their kitchen and living space. We tend to draw people in through our great content, and then we introduce them to our shop.

TIC: What types of products do you have for sale and how do you curate/source them?
AH: On Provisions you’ll find everything from spices and ingredients to serving pieces and cookware to pet toys and clothing to cookbooks and tote bags. We believe that how you eat and how you live are inseparable, so our shop offerings stretch beyond the kitchen. We have an internal team of six people devoted to sourcing and merchandising, and they’re helped along by a team of Pinterest scouts — stylists and others who we’ve identified to help us find the best products.

TIC: You’ve been able to marry content and commerce so smoothly on Food52, where products for sale on Provisions are integrated into the editorial posts. What’s your secret for making this work?
AH: There’s no true secret here. When you cook, there are lots of things you need, from ingredients to tools to tableware, so it makes sense to share our favorite pasta dish in a beautiful serving bowl and likewise to feature our serving bowl filled with a Food52 pasta recipe to show you how you might use it at home. There’s a natural affinity between our editorial content and our Provisions products, and we believe giving people everything they need in one place makes things easier for them and helps us build a stronger bond with our readers and shoppers.

TIC: How does your background as a food writer help you in creating content for commerce?
AH: I think it was more my experience as an editor that’s helped. When you’re editing, you’re putting together narrative packages — a story, visuals, headlines and subheads that draw people in and, ultimately, sell the reader on it. Good commerce tells a story as well. It’s not just about getting someone to buy a product, but telling the story of the product through the way you present it, whether that’s through photos, gifs, descriptions or even call-outs that reflect exactly why it’s so great. People want to connect with the stories they read just as much as they want to connect with the products they buy. If you sell things you really believe in and can share that belief with shoppers, you have something powerful.

TIC: A lot of our readers are interested in merging content and commerce but don’t know where to begin. Can you offer some best practices?
AH: When people are looking for content, they aren’t looking to have products pushed on them. And when they’re looking to shop, they don’t usually want to have to read long stories to find what they’re looking for. There’s a delicate balance with content and commerce. Products and editorial need to be naturally complementary and you have to keep the reader and shopper in mind at all times. Our rule of thumb is to weave our editorial and products together as much as feels natural and helpful — and no more.