Roll-Up Roll-Up! Cakes, Bakes & Growth (&an oven!)

Aim

Hello: Last year I closed my shop, reassessed, reopened a street food stall, hoped it would work.... it did 🙌 .... Now I need a bigger oven

Hello
Hello and welcome to my One Sweet Day crowdfunding campaign page.

I am here to raise enough funds to purchase and install a new oven and mixer in my street food cake stall plus some other smaller things that would be beneficial. 

• I really don't want debt of a bank loan
• I don't want your charity (there are far more worthy causes out there that need our help at the moment)
• I want to work insanely hard this summer and do things a little bit differently
• I need approximately £2,500 but as I am not wanting you to donate - like you would a charity, I need to raise £5,000 in pledges - which will leave me with approximately £2,500 profit once I have fulfilled all the orders.

The Basic Plan

• May 2023: Hopefully amazing, beautiful, positive people such as yourself 😁😉 will pledge £20 each - but you can pledge less or more, by the deadline of 23/5/2023. If I don't reach my goal by 23/5/2023, then I will not get a penny and you will get your pledged money back 🙈🙉🙊.... why the heck did I tick that option!?!! - In truth, after an incredibly rocky few years, juggling so many plates, it's just a challenge to get my teeth into, really focus - and I like to make life a little more interesting.
• June 2023:  I will reach the £5000 target💪.... 🤞 and get everything I need installed
• July-Sept 2023: You get your pledged value of goodies baked and delivered by my good self - and my little team - or you can collect at an agreed date... HAPPY DAYS!!

What You Will Get and When
In addition to receiving a warm fuzzy feeling for helping a small independent business really re-establish itself, you will also receive a box of DELICIOUS, FUDGY, GORGEOUS Handmade Brownies or cupcakes or a treat box.... whatever you choose from my range, posted directly to you or whoever you choose to send them to.

• If you live in Chorley/ Wigan/Leyland area and you pledge and pay £20 or more to the campaign between 26/4/2023 and 23/05/2023:
  I will bake you £20 worth of One Sweet Day brownies, cakes, cupcakes or treats between 1/7/2023 and 30/9/2023
• If you live anywhere else in the UK and you pledge and pay £20 or more to the campaign between 26/4/2023 and 23/05/2023:
  I will post £15 worth of One Sweet Day Brownies or postable treats out between 1/7/2023 and 30/9/2023 and £5 of your pledge will cover Post and Packing

Brief Introduction
Now, I will give you a bit of history and facts and figures. I have rewritten this so many times, I have a good background in Buying and Merchandising, and I love a spreadsheet and as such, I am trying to keep this strictly business, however it has been an emotional few years with One Sweet Day, and I am struggling to complete this without going into it.

I have been trading as One Sweet Day since 2012 and as Sweet Annalise for approximately 2-3 years prior to that. In the 14ish years since I began selling cakes, I have seen so many more similar businesses open and I have seen quite a few close. However, I am unbelievably hard working, tenacious and resourceful and I have had to be patient while my kids got a little older and life settled down. Regardless of this, I am proud of my achievements to date, but I have not reached my goals yet.

 Some achievements of running the shop include;

• In my busiest year I turned over £70k (with the help of my amazing team)
• I have a well-established and very loyal customer base
  
  
• I have seen my product range and skillset increase hugely as new trends have come and gone, and my regular customers – and the marketplace – demanded new products in order to remain competitive.
• The majority of celebration orders are repeat custom (many times over usually)
• In 2021 monthly sales for March and August were above £8k +90% on the previous year’s average monthly takings
• I was one of the most googled businesses in Chorley and as such, got requested to feature on their internal 360 degree imaging function on Google Maps

Recent Timeline of events that have got me to this point
I feel that people may question, if I have been going for so long, and if things are going well, why the need for investment now? Therefore, I think a brief(ish) chronological history is the easiest way to explain this;

• 2009 I hold my first farmers market stall, and continue to do farmers markets and festivals, build a steady customer base alongside my full time career and having 2 children (2014 and 2016)
• In January 2018 I took over a town centre cake shop – it was seriously hard work, but I love a challenge and I started to find a rhythm.
• In 2019 I left my partner and so had a gorgeous 2.5 year old little girl and a beautiful 5 year old little boy (who is on the spectrum / selective mute) to look after … while running the shop and in a different county to the support of family and close friends
• In 2020 we went into lockdown, I had 4 part time staff. I furloughed them for approximately 4 weeks while I put a plan together, then we adjusted our way of working and we worked hard – alongside home schooling 2 young kids through the 1st lockdown.
• In 2021 I really felt I had found my stride with everything, my 3 or 4 staff members had been with me for years, sales were up from averaging £4k per month to £6-7k per month and so I took on a former weekend employee as an apprentice. Especially pleased as the government incentive for apprentices was increased during covid – excellent! So now I had 5 part time staff 😊
• In March 2022, the 1st £2000 payment was due from Apprenticeship Service but it didn’t appear. They stated I was ineligible for a number of reasons – it absolutley was not the case
• In April 2022 I sent evidence to disprove their comments, to which they thanked me for the evidence and they would review it but they couldn’t give me a timeframe, or manage my expectations as to when that decision will be (subsequently I struggled to give my staff answers). £2000 was more than my wages bill for the month. In order to try and fill that £2000 gap with clear profit in my forecast/cashflow, I needed to take and fulfil approximately £4,500 of cake orders and sales!!! – I had to try and take more orders than we could manage but not give the girls extra hours as I was now behind with their wages, also unable to buy ingredients as easily because everything was slipping due to this hole in my cash flow/forecast. I would work at home once kids were in bed and every other weekend, when my kids were at their Dad’s, I would fairly often work from 8 am Friday until 11am Saturday- straight through the night -  to fulfil orders  and then my Saturday girls would insist I go home for a few hours rest, then back in for the last few hours of Saturday shift.
• In August 2022 I handed my notice in at the shop – I was mentally and emotionally exhausted and I wasn’t running the business – it was running me. The apprenticeship service continued to say they would get in touch when I chased them throughout the summer, but I couldn’t fill that gap – in fact it widened as I was juggling so much and my health was at the risk of suffering
• September 2022 (I think the 24th) I received an email from the Apprenticeship service saying that I was actually eligible for that payment!! (I was furious/relieved in equal measure).. but it was too late
• September 30th 2022. I closed the shop, laid off my girls and moved some of my equipment over to a new street food stall on Chorley Market, the rest of the equipment I offset against debts that had built in the 6 months prior.
• October 2022. Start selling in the new market location, I was the first food stall trading in there, so it was slow to start, but the energy was good and I felt back in control. 
• March 2023. I have been baking and selling from my Market Stall for approximately 6 months and it is great! There are 5 other food vendors in there (Greek, Indian and Caribbean food, a micro pub and a coffee shop/stall)

Future Plans
Now we are getting established on Chorley Market – sales of brownies are already far exceeding what they were at the shop, I sleep a lot more, my kids see me more and I have had time to collect my thoughts and revisit my business plans.

There are 2 main areas of focus:

• The Stall: Currently sales (including Celebration cake sales/orders) are £1k per week. Need to increase this by a minimum of +75% which will ensure my wage on top of rent, bills and wages
• Online Orders: I had an idea approximately 9 years ago that people could order my brownies and flapjacks online and send them as gifts so I got a wordpress website built and it ticked by, but was never anything earthshattering in terms of sales. Since lockdown, this market sector has grown dramatically and I feel One Sweet Day really should be competing with greater presence within the online cake/ brownies marketplace.

In addition to that, I am also continuing to work more with other corporate partners and complimentary businesses to raise awareness of One Sweet Day within the area.

Position of Strength
Experience in my previous career of sales forecasting with space and product analysis within Buying and Merchandising, combined with my accrued years’ experience in the cake industry and now a more central position within the town centre, not to mention vastly reduced overheads, it feels an exciting time for me and One Sweet Day.

In addition to this, since closing my shop in Sept 2022, I have given more time to researching my son’s selective mutism and ASD. Trying to find ways to help him feel less anxious - trying to find the magic switch inside his head that will enable him to talk to his teachers and the rest of the world with ease, and moreover, trying to battle for his diagnosis and support for me and him on this. This was a contributary reason to me closing my shop last year, I have had time to relentlessly pursue channels - and get knock backs since then but we finally have an assessment date in September this year, after me trying to get him assessed for 6 years!! so it is one less thing to worry about for now, which is a relief.
The reason I mentioned this is that, during this time, it has come to light that I have probably had ADHD my entire life - not as much as some but enough to have created a lot of underlying anxiety, that has in turn affected how I time manage and plan (or don't stick to my plans because I would move to the next idea, or suffer a bout of anxiety that would throw me off track and lose my focus) . I am academically bright and technically and creatively really capable, however I get anxiety in certain situations and when this occurs, my ability to plan can lapse. I have been aware of this behaviour and worked around it throughout school, college, University and in my career - and got frustrated by it throughout my life. But I think the pressures of being self employed during a global pandemic - without the structure of a larger organisation, really exploited this, and you wouldn't know from the outside too much, but I felt it internally - and dealt with it. However upon reading about ADHD I had a genuine light bulb moment a few months ago, I got a little emotional and am already managing things better after reading suggested coping mechanisms and speaking with my GP, and just understanding it - and myself (as naff as that may sound) a whole lot more.

This is probably what gives me greatest positivity for the future. I have achieved a lot in my Merchandising career and whilst working for myself even with these weaknesses, but now I am getting a better understanding of managing this  – and it feels brilliant.

In Closing
If you have read this far... well done!

Seriously, I am immensely grateful for any support that you can offer for this crowdfunding project, I know it is a cheesy line but it really would mean so much to me, my team and subsequently my family.

If you want to order Brownies from me outside of this fundraising event and for a specific date/occasion, then you can order Brownies for nationwide delivery on my website.

Thank you so much and I look forward to baking for you

Sweet Regards
Annalise

This project successfully funded on 23rd May 2023