Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Blair Werline. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Blair thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard

The way I run my business is definitely different from the way most bakeries are operated. As of right now, I do everything myself. From social media to customer service to actually processing and making your order…it’s all done by one person, which is rare nowadays.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

Baked by Blair was created in September of 2019, right before the pandemic hit. I was working full time and just started attending culinary school at the Culinary Institute of America in San Antonio. I was so passionate and eager to learn in and outside the classroom, so I started experimenting at home and taking my creations to work. Fellow associates would place orders and the next thing I knew, I was taking weekly orders on top of work and school full time. Safe to say, I was running off no sleep trying to juggle everything and realized this was just not going to work anymore. So I left my job and decided to start Baked by Blair officially. I got an LLC, created social media accounts, and opened an account with square and just started taking orders here and there. When the pandemic hit and we went into lockdown, everyone had to start celebrating their birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries at home. That’s when the company really started to see growth as far as clientele and orders being placed consistently. I started to build relationships with my clients who still place orders til this day. I was able to hone in on my craft from my very own kitchen and learn from my mistakes. The orders I take on now are definitely something I couldn’t see myself doing a few years ago and I absolutely love the fact that I can serve the community in my own way. Seeing a client get excited over one of your creations is just so fulfilling, I am truly blessed to be able to do what I do.

Any fun sales or marketing stories?

One year I had a pie sale for thanksgiving and ended up having over 100 pie orders! I was in way over my head. I was still in school and honestly, I JUST learned how to make a pie from scratch in class. So I thought, hey! This would be a great sale for thanksgiving, I mean cmon, it’s pie! Turns out, I was absolutely right. I received so many orders over social media and started to plan accordingly. My amazing classmates knew about my sale and would give me their leftover doughs from class, which helped tremendously. I don’t know if you’ve ever made a pie from scratch before, but it’s a lot of preparation. Just rolling out the dough for every pie was exhausting, but what I didn’t think about was oven space! I only had one oven in my tiny 1 bedroom apartment, so I asked to use loved ones kitchens. I would go over to my brothers house, neighbors, and even a family I used to babysit for! They were all so generous and would let me go over and use their kitchens, filling up their homes with the fragrance of apple, pumpkin, and pecan pie. When the week of came, I have to be honest, it was a shit show. I was running between peoples houses to bake and would send loved ones to the store because I would run out of an ingredient. Sleep wasn’t an option that week which had me delirious at times. I remember a friend came by with some food and literally made me stop what I was doing to go get some rest. At that point, I couldn’t fight it…I needed sleep. Luckily, I was able to finish all the pies on time and had two delivery drivers running around town while I texted and called all my clients to let them know their pie was on it’s way. It was stressful, but so rewarding when I finished. Now, I would never accept that many orders by myself. Lesson learned.

What’s worked well for you in terms of a source for new clients?

Yelp and Social media have been two huge sources for this company. Specifically, Facebook and Instagram. I wake up everyday to new messages from interested clients that say they found my page on Yelp, its pretty awesome!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @bakedbyblair_
• Facebook: @bakedbyblairw
• Yelp: https://yelp.to/9EwYWcRfqub
• Other: TikTok: @bakedbyblair