We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Marissa Saucedo. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Marissa below.

Marissa, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today How did you come up with the idea for your business?

Originally, I didn’t want to start my own business. I loved just clocking in and out, but wasn’t able to do that with what I wanted to do. I wanted to decorate cookies, but no bakery was interested in bringing that in at the time, so I had no choice but to do it myself. I was 19 at the time, still living at home so what did I have to lose? I quit my full time- minimum wage job and starting selling to friends and family, and offering local businesses free product to try. Once I started, I knew this is exactly what I wanted to do.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My names Marissa, I’m 21 years old and I own Sifted and Sugared, a small cookie bakery in San Diego. I specialize in custom decorated sugar cookies, creating special desserts for you to enjoy for any milestone in your life. I strive to make every order personal and detailed, making it memorable in every way. As well as custom cookies, I also offer mini decorated cookies, drop cookies, and tea cakes. I provide a variety of decorated cookie flavors such as vanilla bean, chocolate chip, cinnamon roll, birthday cake, chocolate peanut butter chip, and lemon poppyseed. Your dessert table isn’t complete without a Sifted and Sugared cookie.

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

When first starting out, I gave away a lot of product. I made custom cookies for everyone I knew and then some. A lot of time, effort and money went into product that was going for free, but that’s how you build great connections with vendors and clients. It’s true that you need to spend money to make money, so don’t be afraid to do so! The more connections I built, the more references I would get. I would also say that being personal with your clientele helps build character for your business and makes people want to purchase from you. Be as genuine and real as professionally possible, and don’t be afraid to show yourself!

How did you build your audience on social media?

I would say social media presence is one of the hardest things to create. It’s so difficult to create content that the algorithm pushes out to your clients feeds. The biggest thing that I would focus on is being consistent. Put out as much content as possible, and make it visually pleasing so people will draw to it and want to save it for later to look back on. Show your process in videos, and more ‘behind the scenes’. People love seeing where their product is coming from if they’re choosing to shop small. Show them where it’s coming from.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.siftedandsugared.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/siftedandsugared/