We were lucky to catch up with Sandra Mejia recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Sandra thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Coming up with the idea is so exciting, but then comes the hard part – executing. Too often the media ignores the execution part and goes from idea to success, skipping over the nitty, gritty details of executing in the early days. We think that’s a disservice both to the entrepreneurs who built something amazing as well as the public who isn’t getting a realistic picture of what it takes to succeed. So, we’d really appreciate if you could open up about your execution story – how did you go from idea to execution?

Having always dreamed of having our own business, and also having becoming very conscious about the food we ate, we just decided it was time to do something we were passionate about. We researched into chocolate and realized we could make it from beginning to end, which gave us control of the end product and we could offer a healthier version of chocolate full of natural delicious flavors while keeping as much of the healthy portion of cacao as possible to reap those benefits. Getting started was the hardest part as it takes a lot of work and it is more risky to quit your previous job. So we basically worked our in our regular jobs and all the other extra time was spent on our new business.
We were able to make the chocolate in our home with the Cottage Food Permit and our first selling channel was the local farmers markets. These markets were a wonderful connection between us and our customers. We received a lot of feedback and improved our chocolate as much as we could.
When we realized there was potential, we rented our first manufacturing space. Little by little our production increased and we were able to purchase more equipment.
A couple of years later, we were contacted with an opportunity to open our first retail shop. They were so helpful in dissolving our fears by allowing us to test the market with no compromise. We painted and made our own shelves with so much love. From then on, word of mouth has been our best marketing strategy. From the farmers markets and our store we were able to find wholesale customers and expand into other product offerings.
Eventually, we went for it and quit our day jobs. It has been hard work and effort but it has been also extremely rewarding. We would not have it any other way.

Sandra, 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?

We make chocolate directly from the cocoa bean. Our chocolate is vegan and organic. Our purpose is to offer a healthier chocolate alternative made with wholesome ingredients that are good for you. We started our company from a passion for business and food and to make a difference in the food industry.

Can you open up about a time when you had a really close call with the business?

There was a time when we were not sure our company would make it. It was our fourth year in business and we were already experiencing some difficulties as we were growing but we could not find anyone who would fund our business. Banks required history and all we had left was our credit cards, which had already been used to the max.
Then our first child was born. From this moment on we had no time for anything and were forced to focus most of our attention to our new baby, and very little was left for our business. After surviving the first few months, we decided to get our hands dirty again and brought our baby to the factory with us to work on production ourselves as we had to let go of some of our employees.
We worked at odd hours to be able to attend both our baby and business. Little by little we came up for air, got some new accounts which helped our sales and recovered. Two years later when we had our second child, we were way more prepared and our business was stronger.

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

We realized that the main focus should be to have a good quality product because the best growing strategy is word of mouth. What your customers think of your product the first time they try it makes a huge different. If we make one customer happy, we know there will me many more customers that will come from that.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.nibblechocolate.com
• Instagram: nibblechocolate
• Facebook: nibblechocolate
• Yelp: Nibble Chocolate