We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jean DeLeon. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jean below.

Jean, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about a time you helped a customer really get an amazing result through their work with you.

Growing up I loved to bake and watch videos of people decorating cakes. It became a passion and I wanted to bake for family and friends. As a teenager, I would try different recipes and give stuff away. Eventually, people started asking me to bake cakes for birthday parties and word of mouth led me to Jean’s Little Shop where I had thousands of people that followed my home bakery. I became a teacher and continued to bake as a side business. After years of doing this and watching my customer base grow, thoughts of opening a bakery came to my mind. I was nervous that if I took that leap of faith, I would fail and would waste money and time, but my husband promised me that there’s no way he would let me fail. Fast forward, we partnered with some great friends of ours that love to cook. We had some food/dessert taste testings and got great feedback. We Had some set backs with Harvey and Covid but we were determined to make this happen. In 2021 I decided to make a very emotional decision to leave teaching to pursue my dream of opening The Box Bakery & Kitchen. With the help of my amazing parents, we quickly found a place, renovated it and turned it into a place we could call ours. We built hype in the community and are known for delicious breakfast tacos, smoked bbq, beautiful custom cakes & great desserts. It has been a huge learning experience and we have met some amazing people along the way. There have been days that I work 12-15 hours and come home exhausted but my husband and I have enjoyed building this for our family. We have an outlet to support the community in so many ways, which has also been a big dream of ours. We hope to continue growing our business to one day be able to make an even bigger impact.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

One of the things that sets us apart is that we try to make everyone feel at home. We do our best to greet everyone with a smile and a kind welcome when they walk through our doors. Our food and baked goods are made with quality ingredients. We make things with love and want that to be reflected in the products that we put out.
I love a great challenge when someone asks me to make a custom cake. Often, I have to research new skills to stay current and I sometimes surprise myself with the things I can do.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

Teaching was my career. It helped me build relationships with students, parents, my co workers and the community. It is a very hard job but also a rewarding one. One of my favorite things was receiving emails and phone calls from former students or when they would stop in to see me. I loved Knowing that I was a part of their story. I always told myself to be the teacher that when someone thinks back to school, they smile and remember the way that I helped them be successful. Knowing that I put my heart into teaching, it was a very tough decision to leave. I knew that I would feel guilt and sadness. It hurt my feelings to know that I would no longer have my school email address and students would have a hard time reaching me in the future. After lots of tears, I knew it was something I wanted to pursue. Some of the greatest moments are seeing former students walk into my bakery and reach out for a hug. Although I don’t get to see students walk down the hallway to visit me anymore, I know that I left an impact on many. I now teach cake and cookie decorating to kids and enjoy incorporating my passion for teaching with my baking skills.

Any advice for managing a team?

We like to build a “family” with everything that we do. My husband Josh is the glue to that, while I am the behind the scenes person. He often comes in to the bakery at 5:30Am shouting greetings, while the rest of us are half asleep. He writes notes of encouragement, and brings that joy to any room he walks in. He enjoys talking with customers and building those relationships. I make him do most of our on camera stuff because he thrives in that environment. We believe in building a team/staff that has fun and works hard. We do our best to take care of our employees and be as flexible as possible. Of course, always live by the golden rule and treat others the way you want to be treated.

Contact Info:

• Website: Theboxbak.com
• Instagram: @theboxbak
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theboxbakeryandkitchen
• Yelp: https://yelp.to/oB27rItSFsb
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@theboxbak?_t=8V1GbtECAH8&_r=1