The First Two Weeks

Busy, busy, busy!  It's been a great, but exhausting first two weeks.  Lots of working hours, little sleep and no time for meals. 

We are still trying to get into a routine of some kind and just when we think we know what we are doing, we find out that we really do not.  Judging how many cupcakes we need each day has been quite challenging!

With all of that said, it is still exciting to walk into our bakery, nearly everyday, and realize that it actually exists.  It is not just a dream but a reality!  And, we have customers!  Thank you to everyone that stops by to visit us each day.

We were interviewed during our first week in business and had an article written about us this past Wednesday at patch.com.  Here is the link if you missed it or if you would like to see how it all began http://mehlville-oakville.patch.com/articles/oakville-moms-are-taking-the-cake-with-icing.

We have been really busy in the special order department the last two weeks.  Just a reminder - if you need to place a special order, please do so early.  Our weekends fill up fast and there are a limited number of orders that we can fill each week.  We were completely booked this weekend and had to turn down several orders, which we don't like to do.  Because we are a small bakery, with limited equipment and staffing, there are only so many baking hours in a day for us, which limits the number of special orders that we can fill.  We will do our best, but we may have to say no occasionally. 

Speaking of special orders, the following are a few pictures from some of our orders the past two weeks.

A wedding cake for today. 

A birthday cake for Sunday.  This had coordinating cupcakes and soccer ball cookie favors, too!

Last weekend's wedding cake for a good friend.

Extra large cupcakes cakes!  Look how small our regular cupcakes look when up against the cupcake cake! 

A baby girl ogre cake for my little niece who is turning two.  She loves Shrek!

We have had many questions regarding special diets in the past two weeks - allergy friendly, dairy free, diabetic friendly and gluten free.  Because we are small and have limited equipment, it may be impossible for us to provide true allergy free/gluten free products.  Dairy free and diabetic friendly options may be a possibility in the future, but we do not currently have these items in our menu.  We are experimenting with a few recipes.  Our goal before introducing these products to our customers is to be sure that they taste great and are safe to consume.  We do not want anyone to eat anything that will make them sick, due to a pre-existing condition, so we will keep you updated!

A new menu for next week will be posted by Sunday night!  Let us know what your favorite cupcake is - either by commenting here or on Facebook.  Hoping to add a couple new ones to next week's line-up!

Grand Opening Weekend!

We did it!  We are officially open for business.  It was an extremely busy weekend.  If you stopped in, thank you!  It was great to see so many of our friends, family members and new customers.  We truly appreciate all of the support that was shown throughout the weekend.  We couldn't have done it without all of you!

A few special thank yous to - Mark, Bill, Liz, Ed, Angela, Bob, Amanda, Lisa, Jim, Gene, Kaitlin, Holly, Macy and Anna.  Without your help, we would have never been able to open the shop on time or keep up with our cupcake sales this weekend!  We sold over 1000 cupcakes and with the help of our friends and family members, we were able to meet the demand!

Everyone pitched in - folding boxes, making runs when we were out of supplies, baking, icing, cleaning, mixing and more!  You will never know how much all of you are appreciated and loved.

It was a great weekend overall, a little warm, but great!  Our lobby was full almost all weekend and some were even brave enough to sit at our outside tables in the heat.  Hopefully, we are past that and now you will be able to enjoy your sweets and the weather on the patio if you wish without melting.

Macy decided to enjoy hers at an indoor table!  Mmmmm - chocolate peanut butter!

I am now in the process of making some changes to this website.  It may take a day or two, but from now on, we will be posting our weekly dessert flavors here under a Weekly Menu tab.  Each week we will select at least 6 cupcake flavors and at least one item from each of the other categories on our menu.  We will offer that menu everyday for one week, and then the following week, we will change it up a bit.  You are always welcome to call ahead and order your favorite flavors, but we will not have all of our flavors everyday.

If you would like to place an order for an item that is not on our Weekly Menu, just send us an email or give us a call.  We are always happy to accommodate!  Soon, there will be a Prices tab, as well.

If you know you will be needing more than a dozen of any one item, give us a call!  We bake in small batches, so we will throw a few more in the oven, just for you!  Let us know what time you would like to pick up your sweets and we will have them boxed and ready to go!

And, because it wouldn't be a post without a cake picture - here is a buttercream Dr. Seuss cake that was made for a baby shower, complete with paint splashes and a fish in a teacup!

Thanks again to all who stopped in this weekend!  Hope to see the rest of you soon!

Change of Plans!

So, this week we had some set backs.  The worst being that our bankcard number was stolen and used to purchase about $700 of computer equipment.  Luckily, we are covered and the money will be returned within the next week.  Thank goodness our account is monitored very closely or they may have wiped us out within a couple days!

Several good things happened over the last two weeks, too!  Our full sheet oven was delivered yesterday!  We are ready to fire it up.  It will be great to bake 100 cupcakes at a time, compared to 24 in my little oven at home.

While I was on vacation, the new floors were installed.  It made a dramatic difference!  No more blue and red tile, just beautiful wood floors and dark trim.

The first of our vinyl lettering has made it onto the wall.  Beth installed our tag line above the kitchen window.   It looks so good!  Thanks to Amy W. for helping us with our decorating.  I hope I am not driving her completely insane with all my emails, text messages and phone calls. 

Our refrigerated bakery case was delivered right before I left for vacation.  It is, quite possibly, my favorite piece of equipment so far.  This is kind of a mini bakery case, but it is plenty big enough for our cheesecakes and cream pies!  It is just adorable!  I'm sure I am the only person on the planet who finds a bakery case adorable, but I can't help myself.  It may also be the fact that it was the first piece of NEW equipment to be delivered.  We purchased a lot of used equipment that had to be scrubbed from top to bottom, inside and out.  When this arrived, we used a little Windex to clean off the fingerprints, but other than that, it was CLEAN!

The last few nights, I have been working on our menu boards.  Beth found four picture frames, two that are really large, and painted them up with a sort of silver antique-like finish.  She then cut some wood to fit each frame and painted them with chocolate colored chalkboard paint.  We could use them as chalkboards, but wanted to fancy them up a bit.  So, we are using vinyl lettering.  These are the two that are finished.  I still have two more to go!

And that ends the sneak peek pictures.  We still have counter installation on the schedule for this weekend and the first part of next week!  These are the last interior pictures I will be posting before our opening.  To see the finished product you will have to come visit us!

We have made the decision to delay our opening by one week. Working with the Health Department is not a quick process. Just today we received our letter stating that we have Department of Health approval. This does not mean we can open. We now have to schedule two inspections and pray that they don't require us to make any major changes. At this point, we are relatively confident that this will not be a problem. Our first inspection will be on Monday.  Wish us luck!

So, Labor Day weekend, we will have special hours for our Grand Opening Celebration! We will provide free coffee and tea, along with samples of of some of our fresh baked desserts. Additionally, we will have a variety of our daily dessert and drink items for purchase.  We will resume our regular hours the following Tuesday.  Here is the information for our opening.

Grand Opening Weekend!

Friday, Sept. 2 from 4 pm – 8 pm

Saturday, Sept. 3 from 9 am – 3 pm
Sunday, Sept. 4 from 10 am - 2 pm

 

We hope that you, your friends
and your family will
join us to celebrate
the opening of our bakery!

We are located in the
Dierberg’s Shopping Plaza at

5688 Telegraph Road

St. Louis, MO 63129

Several of you have asked for a flyer containing our opening information.  I am attempting to post a link to a printable Grand Opening flyer.  If I am successful, it will be located to the right of this post with the title Grand Opening.  We will also be sending the flyer via email and posting the information on facebook.

And because it wouldn't be a blog post without a cake picture, here are a few!  Before I left for vacation, I did this Baby Einstein cake for a first birthday.

And this Winnie the Pooh cupcake tower for a first birthday.

And, last but not least, Africa cookies!   This is a hand-shaped cookie cutter that started out as an oval.  I've never had a request for a cookie shaped like a continent, but it can be done! 

Hope to see everyone at our Grand Opening!