We recently connected with Louis Hohl and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Louis, thanks for joining us today. One of our favorite things to brainstorm about with friends who’ve built something entrepreneurial is what they would do differently if they were to start over today. Surely, there are things you’ve learned that would allow you to do it over faster, more efficiently. We’d love to hear how you would go about setting things up if you were starting over today, knowing everything that you already know.

If I were to start over today in the bakery business, I would start by setting up multiple streams of income right at the start. What I mean by that is, bakery owners tend to focus on just the bakery itself and tunnel vision sets in especially if things are going well. Taking care of walk in customers, their orders and requests and keeping the store clean and fresh is obviously a priority but it shouldn’t be the ONLY priority. If I have learned anything its that customers are cyclical and no matter how hot you are now, it is inevitable that you will not remain that hot to everyone all of the time. When that day comes, you will want to have different avenues to tap into to remain profitable. When walk in traffic slows, you will kick your own butt if you haven’t planned for that ahead of time. I have found that setting up outside events and pop ups on a regular basis not only fills in the gaps financially, but serves a promotional purpose by pointing out where and how they can get more if they want to. Capturing customer data at these pop ups is crucial for advertising catering, corporate orders and special events as well. Fundraisers are also a significant source of revenue during the fall and winter seasons so I would start making relationships with local schools and non profits by dropping off free goodies with business cards that direct them to a fundraiser page already set up on your website. Make it easy by having all the instructions as well as downloadable pdfs available so they can start immediately without you even knowing. Going back to canvasing and handing out free goodies, I would start that immediately. That way I can build a pipeline of special orders, and catering for future income. Think of all the ways to make money with your bakery that doesn’t include walk in customers and start setting those up pronto. You will thank yourself down the line.

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

My name is Louis Hohl and I am the owner of Sweet Dough Cinna rolls. We are an all gourmet cinnamon roll bakery that specializes in over 100 different gourmet cinnamon roll creations as well as vegan options and Sundaes.

We are currently located in the city of Norco, California inside of Deep Barrel, Coffee and Ice Cream (1188 Sixth St., Norco CA). We developed an amazing relationship with Deep Barrel and are now housed inside of their Roastery, baking fresh cinnamon rolls daily. I think what sets us apart from everyone else is our selection of gourmet cinnamon rolls and the special time and attention we take carefully curating each and every one. They take about 16 hours to make, and everything is made by hand inside of the bakery by myself personally. We are a family owned business, and the majority of our staff consist of myself, my sons, my wife and my four smaller kids. We really aim to make people happy by providing them a unique and amazing product that reminds them of their youth, but also transports them into a gourmet space typically not available with cinnamon rolls. With flavors like our Peach Cobbler Cinna Roll, as well as our ever so popular Pecan Praline Cinna Roll and our Original Sweet Dough Cinna Roll, you are sure to find your new favorite flavor. We also pride ourselves in taking requests from customers so if anyone has a crazy or creative flavor idea, we make sure to make it, test it and try it out prior to serving to the general public. Chances are if you have a really awesome idea we’re going to turn it into a cinnamon roll. If you are ever in the Norco area, please stop by and have an amazing cup of coffee from Deep Barrel Coffee, and dont forget to load up on some gourmet cinna rolls because once they sell out they are gone until the next day.

Have you ever had to pivot?

The covid epidemic was one of the hardest times for small business owners, and served as a make or break point for many. We could have crumbled and succumbed to the fall out or PIVOT and manifest one of the best years we have ever had. Guess which one we chose? We ended up losing our walk in retail location inside of Victoria Gardens food court and was almost at the verge of ceasing operations altogether until I decided to post a video on our social media, asking my customers how they would feel if Sweet Dough stopped making cinnamon rolls. The answer was overwhelmingly supportive and they were devastated by the thought of us stopping. Many said they would stalk me for more, even implying that they would drive to my home to pick them up which got me thinking. Instead of them coming to me, I could go to them. I think I had found my pivot.

I decided to start fielding orders on Instagram. I would post the menu for the week along with the cities I was willing to deliver to and started waiting for the DM’s to pile up. Well PILE UP they did, amazingly so. We were getting so many orders weekly during the pandemic, that we had to create a new way of taking orders, that not only made it simple for customers to order, but also fed into a delivery platform that would allow me to map out the route. It took me 2 months but I built out a system using 3 different apps that communicated with each other and rode out the rest of 2020 like a rockstar, all the way to our best year ever! No store, no employees, just me and my family and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as our guide and dot connector. I firmly believe that if you put the work out there, God will multiply your efforts exponentially and you will start reaping from seeds you didn’t even know you planted.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

My uncle is a very successful business man and whenever our paths cross long enough, I am there picking his brain like the discount section at Target. One day, we both were tasked with caring for my grandmother (his mother) at her apartment complex in a city near both of us. I took it as the perfect opportunity to ask him for some good ol fashioned business advise. Well what he gave me became one of the biggest building blocks of Sweet Dough’s success and it started with Social Media. He said first thing you do is find your competition. That was easy for us, we only had one at the time. He then said find a location of one of their stores nearby and search for their Instagram page. Then find a post on their page that has a ton of likes. Something you think you can duplicate or make look just as yummy. Then find all of the people that liked that post and follow each one of them. Just click follow on every single one. The key is to have a ton of pics already loaded on your page with a catchy logo or symbol so when they see that you followed them, they would want to click on your page. Once they do, you got them. You already know they like what you make, but when they see all of the creative ways we make our cinnamon rolls, we would have them hooked. I did this for months and got so good at it that I was following people without even looking at the phone, just tapping indiscriminately. We were able to get thousands of followers that way, organically and even promoted our very first Farmers Market event months before we had even sold one roll to the public, so much so that we had a ton of people show up to buy from us before we were even set up!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.sweetdoughcinnarolls.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sweetdoughcafe
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sweetdoughcafe