We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Robyn Groenewald a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Robyn, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s jump right into the heart of things. Outsiders often think businesses or industries have much larger profit margins than they actually do – the reason is that outsiders are often unaware of the biggest challenges to profitability in various industries – what’s the biggest challenge to profitability in your industry?

This is an interesting question. Most people would look at a business like mine and think well it’s just cake how much can that really cost. I find this so especially with more intricate flavor cakes that I don’t necessarily make often and have to source the ingredients and then people are surprised at how much more the cake will cost. The time and effort to source the ingredients or to make the filling from scratch to maintain the standard and flavor people expect from my business are not always considered by customers.

I also don’t think people value the time it takes to create a product like they value the time for other things. For example a photographer will charge a lot more for a set of photographs that would probably take a similar amount of time to take and edit. People are prepared to pay more for that product.

Over the last couple of years with the fluctuations in the price of eggs and butter increasing at a pretty alarming rate, profitability has been impacted.

I would say the biggest challenge to profitability for specialty bakers is time vs cost. Being able to charge enough for the time it takes to create.

Robyn, 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’m Robyn, the creative heart behind Bohemian Robsidy, I create cupcake bouquets, hand piped buttercream flowers on cupcakes so that it looks like a bouquet of flowers. I also make custom cakes for weddings and birthdays or any special occasion.

I offer a fairly unique product with the cupcake bouquets, while I’m certainly not the only person making them, they aren’t readily available. I think they appeal to people for there uniqueness and beauty.
I know people like to surprise their guests, they like their guests assuming it’s just flowers on the table and then being able to say actually you can eat them.

I love hearing these stories, it never gets old, hearing how their guests reacted.
I also love the pickup, when my customers come to collect their orders and I get to hand it over and see their reactions, it’s one of the best feelings to see their delight and surprise even though most of the time they’ve ordered it and given me guidance about what they’d like, colors and flowers etc.

I’m proud of the growth in the business over the past year and a half, I have many, many return customers, which is a key sign that you are doing something right. I’m also delighted with the fact that people tell me all the time that my cakes are as pretty as they look. Which is always my goal. It has to be pretty but it has to taste just as good or better than it looks.

I’m passionate about nature and the environment, I’m constantly trying to make choices that are sustainable and good for the environment, which is a challenge and not always possible. But I try my best. I am proud that I offer plant based/vegan offerings. I have even developed a vegan Swiss buttercream, which is a beautiful product, it’s far less sweet than traditional American buttercream, which is something many people are looking for. Is this is you I recommend you try it.

Any thoughts, advice, or strategies you can share for fostering brand loyalty?

I mostly stay in contact with my customers through social media.

I use both Instagram and FaceBook I find it quite interesting how the different people on each platform interact differently on each platform.

I have great intentions of posting on Pinterest and TikTok but keeping up with all of it, just isn’t possible while trying to keep the business running as well.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I think the biggest pivot I’ve had to make in my career was actually when I had kids.

In my previous life I worked in the corporate world doing market research. Once I had kids, I found working and trying to keep up with my mom duties overwhelming. I found a constant pull between trying to be the kind of mom I wanted to be and trying to be the kind of employee I wanted to be. It was exhausting.

I was constantly thinking up ideas of what I could do that would give me the flexibility I wanted. Yet still covering my expenses.

Then back in 2016 we had the opportunity to move from South Africa to the USA. Due to my visa restrictions I wasn’t able to work for a while. This allowed me the opportunity to stop relying on my salary and some freedom to explore my passions. I was naturally drawn to food especially baking.

The rest is history as they say, after some friends saw some birthday cakes I made for my kids, the orders started to grow organically, until I had to ask myself if I really wanted to make this my full time gig, even though I don’t bring in the same figures as I would in the corporate world my mental health and time with my kids are enough to keep me going.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://bohemianrobsidy.go daddy sites.com
• Instagram: Instagram.com/bohemianrobsidy_cakes/
• Facebook: Facebook.com/Bohemian.Robsidy
• Linkedin: Robyn Groenewald