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

Alright, Stephanie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

I had 3 children close together and had been an event designer before that. I couldn’t find any jobs in my field and with having 3 small children it was hard to validate going back to work and paying for childcare. So I stayed home and baked with my kids. My mom and Gram had both been big bakers and i grew up baking with them so I thought it would be a great thing to do with my kids. I started posting on Facebook some of the things I did for my kids birthdays and people started asking me to make things for their kids. The business grew from there organically as word spread.

Stephanie, 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 have an art degree and learned all of my baking from my mom and Gram. What I didn’t know from them I learned online. I started getting into gluten free vegan baking because of my mom and daughter having a lot of issues with dairy and myself having issues with gluten. This has become almost a second business within the business. There are so many people with food allergies and I love seeing them come into my shop and get excited when they see all of the options we have for them. We started vegan ice cream a few years ago which has been another exciting product that our clients love. From a business standpoint, I learned on my own how to run and operate a business. It’s incredibly challenging to be a woman without a lot of knowledge learning as she goes how to operate a business. I’m proud of the fact that I have been able to keep this business going for over 10 years now with a food truck and a brick and mortar. I’m probably most proud of my gluten-free vegan product line and following. It took a long time to build, and to master the recipes and to get some thing that tastes really good but my clients know that they can come and get a nice variety of flavors and items, and that we take all the precautions to make sure that they are made safely and without cross-contamination.

Another product line that I started that has become another entity of the business or our marshmallows. We’ve taken a lot of flavors that we were making as cupcakes and turned them into homemade marshmallows. We are starting to branch out that line to hopefully in the near future be purchased on our website, as well as we are working with some local distributors to get our marshmallows more main stream

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I feel like every day I have a new challenge to face. Most recently inflation has affected my business greatly. The cost of ingredients have gone up significantly, and it’s very difficult to not raise the prices on my clients. I’ve also survived through a divorce with keeping my business going. I could not have done that without the help of my mom, because I have three kids that I still have to take care of also, Covid was a very challenging time. It was also a time for major creativity, which I actually really enjoyed. I could’ve done without the stress of wondering if I would be able to pay my bills or not but I did enjoy having to come up with the new inventive ways to keep my business going.

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

I think my reputation was built very slowly where I was able to control the quality of my product because I was the main person creating people know that they can come and get some thing that tastes really great from me because quality and customer service of my top two focus points in my business. I think it’s really important that you treat each customer that walks in the door whether they buy something or not by greeting them, asking them how they’re doing and thanking them for coming in even if they didn’t purchase some thing, I don’t take shortcuts or buy ingredients that are cheaper because I know that affects the taste and quality of my product. Sometimes it can be very difficult like right now with inflation, but I feel that having a product that taste good is way more important than just putting some thing out for people to buy. Also in recent years, my gluten-free vegan following has grown due to social media and word of mouth about the quality of what I produce. I also find myself being an educator for people who come in and have a friend or a family member or a child that has a food allergy and they need something for that person to enjoy at a party. I am able to walk them through so that they can get some thing that will be enjoyable for their loved one or friends.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.Sugarwhippedbakery.com
• Instagram: Sugar whipped bakery
• Facebook: /sugarwhippedbakery

Image Credits
Joel Wiebner