We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Chloe Davis a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Chloe thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.
The idea for Baking for Backpacks was born out of the COVID pandemic. This left so many families out of jobs and struggling. The year between my 8th and 9th grade year, my mom told me that I should try and help them in some way. After much thinking for many weeks, I ultimately decided that a bake sale to raise money for school supplies would be the best plan of action. I absolutely love baking, so this was a great way to combine one of my favorite hobbies with being able to help the community.
Chloe, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am an 18 year old who really just wants to take advantage of opportunities to help the most vulnerable. This unofficial non-profit does exactly that. At Baking for Backpacks, we put on local bake sales with the help of other members of the community, almost entirely students 18 and under. Every cent that we make in those bake sales goes toward buying school supplies and filling backpacks for other kids in Pinellas County. At this point in time we are focusing on elementary school students in Title 1 schools, but we are hoping to expand beyond just elementary schools as well as get more members in the community involved. Baking for Backpacks strives to live up to the motto, “Kids helping Kids” by bringing up young leaders to help people their age or younger in a meaningful way. Not everyone comes from the same background, but this organization is the perfect opportunity to give those with less fortunate backgrounds an equal opportunity at life starting in elementary school.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
Although we have had decent success from the beginning, there was one bake sale in particular that stands out in my mind. We do all our bake sales outside in the middle of summer in Florida, meaning it is incredibly hot out. One day we were just not having a very successful day. Hardly anyone stopped which really was disheartening and we made only about half of what we normally make per bake sale. Instead of throwing up my hands and deciding this wasn’t going to work anymore, though, I decided the best way to remedy this was to promote, promote, promote! Through our increase of online promotion, expanding our options for ways to donate, and just keeping high spirits we were able to make up for our one bad day by making almost 2x what we normally make.
Have you ever had to pivot?
The most pivotal moment in my journey with Baking for Backpacks was when I decided that this wasn’t going to be a 1 time thing. After the success of the first bake sale, I had to change the way I thought of this. It wasn’t just a one time act of kindness, it was now going to be a lifelong thing that I wanted to keep expanding. It was after this that I actually started running it like a real business or non profit. The way I had to shift my mindset to make sure this continually growing organization ran smoothly was astronomical.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @baking_for_backpacks
- Facebook: Baking For Backpacks
Image Credits
Allison Lynn Photography