We recently connected with Danielle Rowell and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Danielle, thanks for joining us today. Your ability to build a team is often a key determinant of your success as a business owner and so we’d love to get a conversation going with successful entrepreneurs like yourself around what your recruiting process was like -especially early on. How did you build your team?

I recently hired my first team of employees (sales/brand ambassadors and a manager) a few weeks ago corresponding with the opening of my second storefront, which has been very exciting…and truth be told, a little scary!

It has been exciting because hiring a team was proof positive that my business was gaining traction – no small feat in light of the pandemic, supply chain blips, and slowing economic climate.

I had gained a lot of experience in my previous lead and managerial positions writing job announcements, interview questions, candidate rating protocols, interviewing, and selecting the right candidate for the position. However, I had far less experience with payroll and employee labor laws. At first, learning these new skill-sets seemed daunting, but I am very lucky that Kentucky provides a wealth of information to support small businesses accessible via a single, well-organized website.

I used a mix of storefront signage, free job posting websites, word-of-mouth, head hunting, and personal referrals to compile my initial candidate pool. I sought (and continue to seek) a diverse set of candidates that were familiar and excited about my brand who not only possessed all of the traditionally sought after traits (dependability, punctuality, problem-solving); but, more importantly possessed a gift that cannot be taught – a natural customer service-driven personality – the gift of gab, conversation, and interpersonal connection.

You either have it or you don’t.

This nonnegotiable criteria has meant that my team has been growing slower than I would have liked to graduate to where I can completely walk away from daily operations and focus solely on growth. Be that as it may, I strongly believe that taking the time to hire the right support team that complements and reflects both my corporate brand and strategic vision, as well as my own personality will be the single best investment that I can make to ensure consistent up-scaling, stability, and growth for years to come.

I always try to keep the old adage in the front of my mind when team building: “a chain is only as strong as its weakest link.” No truer word has ever been uttered as it relates to this often overlooked aspect of business and entrepreneurialism. I am very cognizant of the fact that I do not simply want to engage the same old hiring tactics employed by other established companies.

I am not just trying to fill a scheduling gap with a warm body. I am not hiring, I am building a support system – a team – of brand ambassadors to aid me in my quest to expand.

As I have slowly started relinquishing daily store operations to my manager, I would be remiss if I did not mention that as the brand’s Founder and CEO, it has been emotionally difficult to entrust my baby (which I have developed from a seed of an idea to multiple storefronts) to another. I think that is natural. However, I am confident in my assembled team’s ability to treat my brand with the same respect, love, and care as I did when working as the company’s sole employee.

Danielle, 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?

Sixteen (16) years ago, I created the world’s first and only edible cupcake cocktail™ – the cocktail you can actually eat — not just adding a little pipette of alcohol to a baked good or a tablespoon for ‘flavor,’ but an honest-to-goodness dessert that has a full shot of booze in it and tastes exactly like a recreation of your favorite cocktail, mixed drink or martini. There are many bakeries adding alcohol to cupcakes out there; but I am still the first and only one to guarantee a full shot after baking in each edible cocktail™, guaranteed topped with our signature moonshine-soaked cherry. I now have quite a few imitators located both in and outside Kentucky who have been trying to replicate my products and brand, but they have all failed. I remain the home of the original edible cupcake cocktail™. My business caters to both B2C and B2B clients. I also cater events and weddings. I ship nationwide! Stay tuned on social media for the release of additional product lines!

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Actually, I bootstrapped the whole startup using personal savings. I still invest quite a large sum into the business.

After the first storefront started generating a profit, I took those funds and reinvested them into the second location. I will continue to do this with each new location, supplementing the amount needed with my personal funds.

I do not draw any profit or salary from either storefront even though I have (and continue) to work as an ’employee’ to shore up any scheduling gaps. I no longer work 7 days a week in the stores, but I do put in a significant amount of unpaid weekly ’employee’ hours (hourly staff) at both locations. Instead, I pay myself ‘a wage’ solely using profits generated from the festival and live event revenue stream.

Notwithstanding the financial gain (wage repayment), I absolutely LOVE, LOVE, LOVE doing the festivals and holiday bazaars because I can market my brand and company to a new customer base (marketing) and gather new information to improve product offerings and recipe development (product development).

I am a people-person. I have the gift of gab and the festival circuit scratches that itch. *smile*
I have a lot of pent up pandemic chit chatting to expel that is still left over from at-home quarantining. *wink/smile*

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

First, take the time to hire the right people that reflect and elevate your brand, vision, and mission. If your employees aren’t your most vocal brand ambassadors, you need to rethink your hiring SOP (or more likely, actually backtrack and develop one using measurable and quantifiable metrics and a clear position assessment). If you don’t know what you need and what you want, how can you effectively hire?

Second, hire a team with skill-sets and attributes that complement and reinforce one another. It all goes back to putting the emphasis on building a team not simply hiring to fill a gap. You want a group of like-minded team players that will gel into a killer sales, customer service, and marketing team. Think of it like this – you are a coach of a division one school and you need to recruit the very best players to build an award-winning team. It is more than just technical prowess, the team needs to be able to work together as a cohesive unit – filling in the gaps, readjusting the planned play, and supporting one another in real time while on the field.

Personality is a key component here that I personally thinks sometimes trumps experience for certain sales and marketing positions.

Third, once you hire your team – RESPECT THEM. You hired them for a reason, train them properly and then trust them to do their job (assess and supplement training, as needed using performance evaluations). Ugh—DO NOT MICROMANAGE.

If you are micromanaging daily operations, then you might as well just do the job yourself. If you cannot walk away from daily operations, you cannot expand and are doomed to stagnate.

Fourth, develop written manuals – employee handbooks, training manuals, workflow charts, job training SOPs – in advance of hiring so that your team has a solid and consistent training foundation. You can hire the best candidates but failing to actually train them properly results in poor performance, frustration, resentment, and walk-out/quitting. Recruitment and hiring is a costly endeavor and yet I always see companies of all sizes stuck in a cycle of continuous hiring and training – all the while negatively impacting the customer experience and diminishing the brand.

In the end, your company is only as strong as your customer base. How do you keep a strong, engaged, repetitive customer base who act as your word-of-mouth brand ambassadors? With killer customer service, which starts with your team.

Fifth, once you have a trusted and reliable team, do not take them for granted. Show your appreciation. From simple ‘thank yous’ to company-wide recognition events singling out exemplary service to engaging fun company events and team-building exercises (paid, of course) – there are countless ways to energize your team and to reward them for exemplary service. It does not have to be gift cards and swag, you should also consider in-house promotions and increased responsibility (like a key holder position for a part-time team member) that sets apart exemplary team members and gives others team members an achievable and recognizable goal.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.inebriatedbaker.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inebriatedbakercertifiedlush/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/InebriatedBakerCertifiedLush
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3W_0_L1kvyUvTwKV1Qr8Iw/videos
• Other: EMAIL [email protected]

Image Credits
Danielle Rowell/Inebriated Baker, LLC