We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Amanda Saylor a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Amanda , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

Sweets & Treats by AJ began in 2015 without much planning. Two friends, baking many kinds of cookies together every Christmas, finally took a risk on others’ encouragement to sell their cookies and started taking orders for Valentine’s Day. A simple Facebook page was created in case customers wanted to order again. And they did. Since sugar cookies have always been one of my favorites and royal icing becoming more popular with its detailed characteristics, we decided that would be our specialization.

We didn’t know what the baking business would turn into when we started. It took a few years to really become busy, but offering cookies for every holiday increased business. Through word of mouth our cookie became more and more wanted for holidays, birthdays, and any other celebration. The softness of our sugar cookies sets us apart from other cookie companies. Customers often tell us that our cookies not only look amazing but taste amazing too.

Our baking business is now ran by my husband and me, and has allowed both of us to leave our tradition jobs to bake full time.

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

I love sweets. I also love making others happy with my sweets and making their celebrations more special.

Sweets & Treats by AJ is a licensed home-produced bakery owned and operated by Chris and Amanda Saylor. We have been married 11 years and have both lived in the Cincinnati area for over 17 years. Before baking full-time, Amanda was a teacher for 14 years and Chris worked in the landscaping industry.

We specialize in decorated sugar cookies that can be customized for any occasion. All cookies are rolled by hand and frosted by hand. Many are detailed by hand piping. A purchase last year of an edible printer which prints edible ink directly on a frosted cookie has really expanded our capability and designs. We can print logos, photographs, backgrounds and almost an image.

We make custom cookies, so we have the flexibility of working with the customer for what cookie shapes fit their theme and ideas.

We make many other kinds of cookies and sweet treats also. Our peanut butter chocolate chip buckeye cookies are our second most popular cookies, which are a peanut butter cookie with a buckeye baked inside and the whole cookie dipped in chocolate. We also make fry pies a few times each year, which very few places locally do. They are a hand held half moon pie filled with fruit filling and fried and then glazed. We now air fry ours to make them healthier than frying in oil.

We love sharing almost every order on our social media for customers and fans to follow and see our current work. We also have a website to simplify the ordering process.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

We started our baking business in 2015 with taking orders through messaging on our Facebook page, while working a full-time job also. Word of mouth is how our business has grown, and no paid advertising.

Four years after starting, we had to make a decision for our business. I would work 8 hours at a job then work on orders every evening at home. When I was having to turn down orders because I couldn’t complete them in evenings only, I knew something had to change. I either had to stop taking so many orders and continue to work a job and build someone else’s dream, or I had to create a plan to replace the income of a job to quit and bake full time and work on my own dreams. Giving 40 hours a week to a job limited the amount of time I could produce in my own business. In the fall of 2020, I quit my full-time job to bake full-time. Four months after me, my husband quit his full-time job to bake with me. We had more mental capacity and time to put into our own baking business because we were not giving it away at a job.

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

I read almost every day. Several books that have helped my mindset and business ownership are The Magic of Thinking Big, Think and Grow Rich, and The Slight Edge. These all offer a different way of thinking and looking at each aspect of business.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.sweetsandtreatsbyaj.com
• Instagram: @sweetsandtreatsbyaj
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sweetsandtreatsbyaj

Image Credits
Amanda Saylor Maria Kirkland