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Starting a Home Bakery

By Sonali Shah Kadakia on 23 Comments / 4657 views

Hi everyone!

I just moved cities after getting married and even though I was a working professional before, I decided I did not want to go back to the corporate environment. I’ve loved food and baking and cooking since a while and went on to maintaining my blog.

After getting a lot of positive feedback about my baked goods, I’ve decided to start my own little business. I intend to make everything at home, with a 1 day advance notice, and let people pick up from my home. I’ve already begun setting up a virtual shop on www.imly.in and hope that is enough.

A few questions I have are:

  • What is the best way to promote a home business other than Word-Of-Mouth marketing?

  • Is it better to have customized boxes or go with standardized boxes at the start?

  • Since a lot of friends and family have already tried my goodies, should I still organize a promotional event?

  • Any other home bakers can give me some advice from their experience?

I now live in Vadodara and while they have the usual Baristas and Cafe Coffee days, there are very few stand alone coffee shops. For this reason, I’ve decided to test the waters with as little investment as possible. 

Thanks in advance for any advice you may have!

Cheers,

Sonali 

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23 Comments

  1. hey sonali,

    you live in a city very close to my heart! will check you out next time i’m in town and perhaps have a small rodinhooders of gujarat meetup!!!

    okay – let’s get started on your queries –

    i) pls use the search engine and look for ashish parikh of cakehunt – he’s based in a’bad and is very very helpful.

    ii) perzen (who featured abhishek of imly on trhs) can really really give you lots of insights [she started a successful food biz from her blog!) pls read these posts AND THE COMMENTS – they are a goldmine for any foodpreneur!

    https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/can-your-blog-become-a-business

    https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/bawi-bride-opens-kitchen-than…

    iii) vikram parekh’s wife has a flourishing cupcake biz – he again, is very very helpful – 

    https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/what-s-cooking-dear-i-asked-p…

    iv) personally – i think you’d rock as a stand alone bakery if you start a small place (with character) that delivers a small, but promising menu!!! later on, as you grow, you could keep adding on to your menu. limited menus that beat customer expectations ALWAYS DO WELL. yes, i’m a huge foodie and when in mumbai/delhi/b’lore/any city of the world, love to spend time at stand alone cafes!!

    v) social media ROCKS! so more than word of mouth – your friends should promote your fb page – PLS USE TWITTER – perzen will tell you HOW MANY ORDERS she gets over twitter!

    vi) GET YOURSELF A FB STORE – powered by sellmojo – am pinging nameet potnis 

    vii) have both standardised boxes and customised. personally i prefer customised boxes. i make haldirams do customised boxes in delhi despite having the option to pick up the readymade ones! connect with tanul of eatopia – they do something called eatopian delights (boxes every month!)

    viii) instead of doing promotional events – take your goodies for sampling to some friend’s office (that has a lunch room) – but carry goods for sale as well. 

    ix) connect with megha – i2cook – she bakes as well! https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/there-but-not-there-i2cook

    x) karan pandhi – is into desserts – look him up!

    xi) other foodpreneurs are – hitesh bhatia (noodle town), divyesh panchal (just unjunk!)

    pinging as many as i can to give you some inputs!

    all the best. keep us posted!!!

    ps: if you’re a coffee lover, pls get some great coffee beans and a machine to go with the goodies. or keep some great varieties of tea/green & black. you’ll be a hit!

  2. Hi Sonali,

    Welcome to the fold! I do Parsi food, Dips and Desserts from my home so while I don’t do baked goods specifically we are in the same boat 🙂

    Imly.in is a good platform to start but I would also recommend that you setup a small page about your menu etc on your blog if you have an existing one or else create a blog and start talking about your recipes etc. Also, find some FB groups such as Foodies in Gujarat or Gourmet Central etc and you can start promoting yourself there. 

    Mumbai has a lot of food based events such as Bombay Local, Mumbai Farmers’ Market etc – it is better to be a part of these as and when they happen in your city rather than do individual exhibitions as in the former all the advertising/marketing is taken care of and you can focus on your food. 

    Also, consider setting up a page on FB and a Twitter account – I am @BawiBride on twitter and would be happy to connect and offer you some tips on how to get started if needed.

    In terms of your specific questions:

    1. Social media is the best way to promote your business. Twitter works better than FB in terms of conversions (atleast in Mumbai). You can also consider finding out who covers food stories in your local newspapers and calling them and asking if you can send them some samples of your food to review.

    2. Don’t undertake the expense of customised boxes just yet. You can use the standard white cake boxes and packaging material for now and then move on to customised a bit later down the line. Instead, get some small stickers made (Won’t cost more than Rs 300) and stick these onto your boxes to give it an individual touch.

    I am available on perzen (at) bawibride (dot) com should you want to connect for some more detailed tips. Congrats on your new business and am sure you will do super!

    Regards,

    Perzen – the Bawi Bride

  3. Hi Sonali,

    This could be the best business for women, who want to do something on their own. Who else can cook better than a woman ? 

    I am from Ahmedabad and we run an online shop,CAKEHUNT. We help customers to get best cakes from the bakers of their choice at actual rate. Also, help bakers, who want to reach masses without any investment of time and money in building an online shop. Like you, we are also a start up. The online shop started in June end. In last 7 months, we have seen so many empty days / weeks (no orders) and now empty hours. 

    If you like, you can join us and become our family member. All your products will be sold with your name and due credit to your hard work. Will try to connect you with some people like Sweta Joshi and others from baroda who are very helpful and can guide you to solve your queries locally. 

    We are here 365*24*7, so please feel free to get in touch with us at 8905 365 24 7. We are just an extension, philosophically, of  therodinhoods. 

    You can join these groups on FB :

    https://www.facebook.com/groups/homebakerspune/

    https://www.facebook.com/groups/354728681265280/

    https://www.facebook.com/groups/173586442829458/

    Thank you Ashatai for the mention. We just follow you. 

    All the best and regards,

    the cakeman, who deliver feelings, Ashish S Parik

    PS: To know more about us, you can check how we started cakehunt.com with the help of therodinhoods.wpengine.com, click here. 

  4. Also, you can get in touch with the Delfoo Team. They are into food home delivery business in Baroda. Link for their website is https://delfoo.com/

  5. Wow!

    @Asha: Thank you so much for being so resourceful! I will be talking to the people you have mentioned and will read on all the articles. Please, please do look me up whenever you’re in Baroda next. I would love to meet up. Right now, I’m hoping to bake at home and just have people pick up or have it delivered to their homes. From what I’ve been hearing from people, the Baroda restaurant market is not easy to break into and many unique restaurants do open up but shut shop sooner or later. I want to test the waters before investing in a coffee shop.

    PS: I love coffee and we have an amazing espresso machine at home with some excellent coffees! 🙂

    @Perzen: Love your blog and totally follow you on Instagram. I did see you at the Bombay Local but it was crazy so I couldn’t really have a conversation with you. Your vegetarian Dhansak was absolutely divine! I intend to work on a similar model and would love to talk to you in detail. I will connect with you over email. 

    @Ashish: Thank you so much for the local resources. I really do appreciate it. I will look into your website and get back to you regarding it. DelFoo is a great idea and up until now, I didn’t know how to solve the problem of delivery. Thank you so much. If I need more local help, I will message you. 

    Thanks guys! You have some great ideas and resources. Will keep you updated about my journey!

  6. Hi Sonali,

    I had planned to come here and tell you what all you can do, then I read Asha’s answer and released that I would be repeating over 90% of what she said.

    Adding to what has already been discussed:

    1. Along with the super people mentioned above, also speak with Vikram Parekh, he helped his wife set up a similar business ( I dont know if his wife is here on thrs) You can connect with him here – https://www.therodinhoods.com/profile/VikramParekh

    2. Having  your own store on Facebook does help – We are helping 2 of the people mentioned above set up a store on Facebook. We also help quite a few Bakeries / Desserts stores,  like Love & Cheesecake – https://go.sellmojo.com/1bbV79h  

    3. I agree with Asha on the promotion through online and offline bit. Perzen does this really well. speak with her.

    4. If you want to read up on some tricks and tips on how to sell online you can check out our SellMojo Blog – https://sellmojo.com/blog

    If you need help with anything, you can drop me a line on nameet.potnis@inscripts.com 

  7. Hi Sonali,

    Well what do I say, the biggies have already said a lot.

    Welcome to Rodinhoods first of all. 

    I would say making customized boxes has a cost, but it helps to let people know about you. This will get people know that some Brand is coming up. I would suggest if you know the customer well (Family and Friends) you can provide them regular plain boxes, and for outsiders you can keep a hard board box. 

    I would also suggest for cakes a strong hard board or any strong box is worth the money as the cake doesn’t touch the box during transport and stays the way it should be Delicious 🙂 

    I would also suggest making a menu and visiting cards.

    If you are running a home based store I would suggest get in touch with Perzen, she has a brilliant traction and sales. 

    You can surely ask me anything regarding food anytime 🙂 

    Regards,

    Karan Pandhi

    You can buzz me, watsapp me on : 9699-246-444

    Founder @ Veging

    Tweet  @Veging

  8. Sonali,

    In case you want someone to chat with or have any doubts, feel free to call on +91 9867359533. I think most of the points have been answered but what you really need to take care of is positioning. Sit down and take a piece of paper and define what you want to stand as and define your target customer right down to the T.

    Also define when your target customer enters what is his reason to do so.

    Once you start you will have loads up qs and loads to crib and bitch about, feel free to call then.

    Cheers & All the best! Your a rodinhooder go & rock!

  9. Hi Shonali,

    I have a couple of friends based out of Mumbai who started baking cakes from home and are doing pretty good in this space. 

    Do let me know if you want me to connect you with them. 

    Well I am in the food business since almost 2 yrs now. Any information or assistance required, would be more than glad to help. 

    Rest, the experts have given the advice. 

    Regards,

    Divyesh Panchal.

    Just Unjunk! 9619323334

    obo.jgd

  10. You summed it up real good!

  11. Hi everyone,

    I have been working in more and more suggestions in my business plan and appreciate everyone’s input. Here’s what I’ve done so far and what are my next steps.

    1. I’ve created my menu and kept it very simple. I will be baking 3 things – cookies, cupcakes and brownies, with some variations. At first, I intended to have breads, eclairs, truffles as part of my menu but that would mean higher inventory costs for me and a confused identity for the customer. 

    2. I have my shop set up on Imly and will go live as soon as my menus, boxes and logo is ready. I’ve been looking into Sell Mojo but for some reason it doesn’t let me add my Facebook page. I will be emailing the administrators to get over this issue.

    3. I wanted to do preview goodie boxes but it seems to incur quite a high cost. I’m still not going to give up on them and hopefully should have a few going out at the end of this month, if the costs work out.

    4. I have been contacting some Freelance Graphic Designers to help me with the logo and menus. Any idea what that charges would be for someone who has perhaps 3-5 years of experience?

    5. I’m looking out now for standard cake boxes in Baroda, but haven’t found any that appeal to me yet. I’m hoping I don’t need to run to Bombay just for the boxes, but have prepared myself for it.

    6. Right now, it looks like I have all the equipment in good, working condition to start off. I’m saving up on those costs for now! 

    7. It looks like I will need a shout out initially and am thinking of making a press announcement to get the dice rolling. Working on those numbers!

    Thank you guys for all your help and all the information! I’m always looking for suggestions and feedback so if you think I have missed out on some points, please do let me know!

    Sonali

  12. Hi,
    Really sorry about the fact that we at @Sellmojo couldn’t jump in earlier and help you set this up without any problems.
    My number is +919821765850. My team is available on +912230551012. If you send me your number as a text, I will arrange for a callback.
    Also, wrt packaging, I don’t know guys in Bandra, but my old vendor is in Mahim ( know him from my resuatrant days) will be happy to forward his details to you too.

  13. hi sonali

    this might interest you!

    https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/rodinhood-meetup-in-ahmedabad

  14. Hi Sonali,

    Myself and my wife started ”CremeFraiche” , a bakery in the year 2007 from our home . But we had one outlet . Three suggestions for you( I am not a Internet man)

    1. Dont go for Customised cake boxes initially , go for the boxes available in the market and stick your logo sticker on the top of it. It will cost you around Rs. 1.00 per sticker

    2. Give your Menu and contcat no.. ( printed on paper) along with every purchase .

    3. Insert fliers in local papers . Some of the Fliers may go waste, but its the value for money Investment in Mmarketing

  15. hey sonali…. any updates?

    would love to hear!!

  16. https://lightgreenoven.com/

    https://www.facebook.com/Lightgreenoven?

    Get Connected to Shipra Chenji based in Hyderabad

    Apart from the stuff , is her hubby Arvind is a photograph expert

    That has attracted everyone 

    More than doing the business

    Is managing the growth  real challenge

    Check it with her directly

  17. RK/Sonali,

    shipra chenji and i studied together in baroda – we are still very very close friends! let me know if you want to get in touch with her! 

  18. What a small wonderful world Asha

    I envy and admire her.  She is biker

    Interior design decorator

    Now bakery from home

    She says , if the stuff is good, people will come .. come what may

    Just last week had Arabian foody  Humus with Olive oil ..

    Sonali … do get connected to Shipra.  with double reference of Asha and RK, you will do well

  19. Dear Sonali,

    Please check out Bakerykart – An Exclusive market place for Bakery Supplies. We could be your prefered supply partner for Chocolate, Ingredients, Food Essence etc. We also working towords getting packaging & disposable items on our platform soon.

    https://www.bakerykart.com/

    Regards,
    Amit

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