Start a profitable baking business today in your home kitchen
Would you like to learn how to start your own baking business from home and make really good money doing it?
Do your friends often ask you to bake cakes, and other baked goods and food items for their birthdays, family gatherings, weddings, or business events?
What if I told you that you could live out your passion, and make an extra $500-$1000 or more a month baking from your own home kitchen?
Starting your own home baking business could allow you to make a very profitable side income, with flexible hours to work around your home and family life.
Additionally, there is an increasingly growing trend of “natural” and “home-baked” foods that people want at their weddings, birthday parties, and other family events…. there is no better time than this to start one!
Meet Jasmine Madison, owner of a successful bakery she started from home.
I met Jasmine in 2019 when I asked small business owners to share their stories on my social media platform to gain exposure for free and possibly gain new clients.
Jasmine’s story is one of the most encouraging and hopeful success stories that I have come across so far!
I asked her to share her story of how she started her home-based bakery and how she turned it into a very successful bakery business called Jazzed Up Sweet Treats in Fort Worth, Texas.
Jasmine has a lot of insightful and practical business advice that she offers here in this article.
If you love to bake and want to make it a profitable business doing what you love, then read through this article from start to finish.
You will gain a much better understanding of what it takes to scale a home-based baking business along with the necessary skills and knowledge of regulations, cottage laws and more for your small business.
Before you read further, please know that this post may contain affiliate links, for which I may receive a commission. There is no cost to you if you purchase through one of these links. Thank you.
Learn how to start your own bakery business from home
1. How did you decide to take your passion for baking and make it a business?
My older sister had a side hustle of making dinner food items and selling them to friends and family. I asked her if she wanted to add some dessert with it to help increase her profit margins. As I shared with her how much I loved baking and dreamed about doing it full-time, she asked me point blank “what is stopping you”, and I didn’t have an answer for her.
My inability to answer this question bothered me so much that it compelled me to start researching the startup costs for smaller-scale home-based bakeries, and I immediately got to work gaining customers and selling my home-baked desserts. Within a very short time, I began getting more orders than I could handle being in a home space. I then decided it was time to expand, so I looked into dessert trailers.
It all just kind of happened at once. Four years later, I am now building my very own storefront, just the way I want it.
2. Did you start out baking with a specialty or niche?
I didn’t want to be a niche baker, but I did want to be a one-stop shop. I wanted it to be the place you could come and get cookies, cakes, pops, cake for a family dinner, or cakes for a special event.
Our specialty is baking from scratch. It seemed like a lost craft. I grew up on freshly baked foods and meals and desserts made from scratch.
With my bakery, we can service your entire dessert table all from scratch and I am very proud of that.
3. Did you create a business model plan?
I did all my legal paperwork at the very beginning. I wanted a professional and successful home bakery business, so I took it seriously from the get-go. It took me about a year to get everything done, as I was doing it in my free time.
My bakery business plan evolved and changed over time because my vision and business model were based on what I thought I wanted and not how I really needed to run my business. As a result, I updated my business plan three different times before I got to the final one.
In my opinion, this allowed me to think of potential obstacles that I would not have otherwise thought of if I had not written out the first business plan. Additionally, this allowed me to be more flexible and ready for changes as they came my way, which it did when Covid hit at the beginning of 2020.
How to write out an actionable business plan
There is a great article from Nerd Wallet that lists step-by-step, how to create a business plan for your business that can be found at Nerd Wallet – How to Write a Business Plan, Step by Step.
4. Did you start your home-based bakery while working a full-time job?
The short answer is yes, but it was extremely challenging at times. You must have the proper support system and assistance in order to do this with a full-time job. Likewise, it also depends on the type of job and hours worked. I do most of my work and prepping on my off days so things run smoothly so that I can use the week to focus on work.
I have days dedicated to the bakery and likewise to my day job. It is just like working two jobs. At some point though, you will come to a fork in the road, and you must choose your 9-5 or your own baking business. You will need to decide to give one over the other the additional time and focus for it to reach its full potential.
5. Were you hesitant to leave your corporate job and go full-time with your bakery business?
I have a degree in business and had been working in the corporate IT world for nine years when I began this journey. I wasn’t afraid to start a new business venture, however, I was definitely afraid of failure and disappointing my family. With three small children, all under the age of 6 years old, my additional income helped us pay the extra costs of living and other expenses without much stress. So the thought of giving up this income was not something to take lightly.
However, I had never put so much time and effort into running a business as I did with baking in my small home kitchen. Even though I have had other businesses, they were never my passion. Baking is my passion and every day I wake up thinking about new ways to push my business to the next level with a profitable marketing plan, how to obtain new potential customers and consistently reviewing how I run my overall business operations. Despite my concerns and fear of failure, I made the decision that when the time was right, I would retire from corporate America, bake full-time, and not look back!
6. What local regulations or food licensing laws are required for operating your in-home bakery business?
There are different laws throughout the United States. Texas is one of the few states that allow you to bake at home under the Cottage Food Laws. Cottage Food laws also require you to put on the physical bakery products:
- Your business name and physical address of your small bakery
- Labels on your food items that list possible “allergy items that are in the food”.
It is important to research what your local government laws are, especially regarding specific Cottage Food Laws and other certifications and licenses that may be required for home bakeries where you live. However, there is no home bakery business license that is required in Texas. With this in mind, I always knew I wanted more as a small business owner. My vision was to become a very profitable business.
So, my first steps were to obtain certain licenses such as:
- Food handles license: To rent space in commercial kitchens
- Managerial license: To operate a food and dessert truck or trailer.
- TABC – Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission License: To expand my business with infused alcoholic beverages.
- Create an LLC with my business name – Jazzed Up Sweet Treats.
The importance of forming an LLC for your small business:
To learn more about creating an LLC or the difference between an LLC and a Sole Proprietorship, read this article here ~ https://www.shopify.com/blog/sole-proprietorship-vs-llc.
7. Is a professional website important if you are baking out of your kitchen?
Yes! Having a professional website is just another key to your success in this business. For this reason, I created my own website at the very beginning to establish my online presence, but it was very basic and non-interactive. It was merely a place you could go to see what we had to offer, however now you can order directly from our website’s online store. Consequently, we are currently in the third phase of redoing the website where customers can custom order and “build your cake” from scratch.
Additional benefits of having a professional website for your home-based bakery:
- To track your target market with your website’s analytics.
- Communicate with a quick response time to your customers
- Compete with even retail bakeries resulting in more business for you!
8. Why did you decide to go from baking in your home to a commercial location?
The business began to pick up and I was running out of space at home. I knew in order to take the business to the next level; I was going to have to get into a place of my own. It is important to understand, that under the cottage law, you are capped on how much money you can make baking at home, and because I do not believe in putting a financial cap or limit on my company, I then started to think about how to transition from my home kitchen to a commercial space.
So, by faith, and with a huge growing demand for producing more baked goods, I had to start looking towards my next step of expanding my business. My husband found an Ad from a Mexican restaurant that was wanting to host an “in-house pop-up shop” in their facility specifically requesting bakeries. After sharing my business ideas, and free samples, we agreed to rent the little space. Because I took this leap of faith, I am now building out a larger more spacious bakery café space.
Cottage Food Laws:
In the State of Texas, your gross annual income from any and all bake sales, technically worded as “your cottage food production operation”, must be under an annual income of $50,000.00 for you to legally be exempt from the requirements of a food service establishment.
With this in mind, when Jasmine was discussing “caps” this is what she was referring to. For more information on cottage laws, you can visit Texas Cottage Food Laws for Retail.
9. What financial investments did you put into your home baking business vs. a commercial space?
When baking at home, all that is needed is your own pans and stove. With moving into a bigger commercial space, I had to purchase the following appliances and other miscellaneous items:
- Commercial convection oven
- Worktables
- Extra storage containers
- Phones, phone and wifi plans, and more!
I began using quite a few more materials in the store vs. when I was at home, so there was no more store runs for small bags of flour and sugar. In short, I started purchasing dry goods and other food items by the pound. I was very proactive in purchasing and stocking up so that once I found the right space, I was prepared and equipped.
10. How do you manage your orders and deliveries?
I learned early on that preparation and organization are the most important in being able to make so many orders for the same day. This is how I currently manage my day with orders and deliveries:
- Most orders come through our website and online bakery business. Again, this is why it is so important to have a professional website.
- Once a certain number of orders come through, all orders are shut off for that day, and it’s all completed and visible on my website.
- I have a business account with USPS and FedEx to ensure we get the best rates.
- I limit how much we ship, so our shipping costs are very small.
- Gas is a major cost, so to ensure customers continue to get good pricing we limit the deliveries to a 25-mile radius.
- Once we open the new location, we will have a whole team to handle deliveries but will continue to follow this system.
When we finish building out our newest location, we can then hire and train a team to help us reach the next level and scale even larger. My goal for my baking business is to become the new household name for scratch-baked goods and to have our brand name a very trusted name.
11. What has been your most successful marketing tool?
Word of mouth, SEO, and Google reviews have been our top 3 drivers. So many people comment to us that we popped up when they were googling the area, and they also comment on how they love our reviews. Nothing happens overnight. It takes time to build your business up, get consistently good reviews, and build a following. We have grown the most via word of mouth and through our amazing google reviews. We have also been blessed to service fortune 500 companies like Robins Brothers Engagement store, Frito-Lay, DHL, and Niagara waters, strictly off of our google search and good reviews!
Having good SEO is vitally important because it puts us at the top with those who are paying for advertising. It also means that we are hitting our target audience and customer base, which is always an important step to growing a successful new business. Social media has played a smaller role in our success, but we do not rely solely on it. You can find our Facebook page here – Jazzed Up Sweet Treats.
12. What advice would you offer for starting a home-based bakery?
These are my recommendations:
Establish your business credit:
- Start building business credit from day one. Having established business credit will make the journey a lot easier financially.
- Do not strictly work with cash alone. Having credit will open more doors for you. I had to struggle because I did everything in cash, and unfortunately, you do not get credit for being debt free. Examples of this could be:
- Using mobile apps to accept payments like Venmo, Apple, or Google Pay
- Invest in credit card readers like PayPal or Square
Keeping your home-based bakery professional:
- Start from the beginning with some kind of website, even if it’s a simple landing page. You can start small and then expand as your business expands.
- Create professional invoices and billing procedures and use a platform like QuickBooks to help keep you organized.
- Keep your business and personal finances completely separate.
- Ensure that you keep good business insurance. Stay on top of the filing dates for taxes or you will be hit with a penalty.
- Know the regulations, laws, and food cottage laws for your local business industry and city.
- Have a good business plan from the start. This is one of the most important steps.
Moving your Bakery into a Commercial Space:
- If you are moving into your own commercial space, ensure you negotiate your rate. Learn some of the terminologies like TI (tenant improvement), Triple Net, 30Net, etc.
- The City and Comptroller are your best friends. They will tell you exactly what is needed to legally operate your business in the city you choose.
Lastly, it takes a huge amount of sacrifice in one area or another to be a successful business owner during the startup phases. But push through the obstacles and you will achieve all that you set your mind to!
And above all…. be organized, don’t cut corners, and always be honest.
13. What personal advice can offer for managing family life and business life?
The best advice I could give is the following:
- You must create a schedule and stick to it. When you are off be off and focus on family time. Do not do any business during off time.
- When my bakery is closed, it IS closed. I do not take phone calls, emails, etc. on my closed or off days. My off days and closed days are for my family. I have a specific day set aside for administrative and business tasks.
- The most important thing is that you must separate the two worlds. Your family deserves to have all of you when you are not working. My family comes first. The fun part is that my kids are getting into sports now, so I don’t schedule any deliveries or orders during their games if I have already committed to being there.
- Communication is key! Make sure your family knows they are a priority, but they must also know when you are working, and your time is committed to each separately. It’s actually really good to have your children see you work hard.
- Don’t be afraid to ask for help. There are times I ask my family to help me to deliver or make something so that I can dedicate that time to something else. I have also hired help with house chores and someone that comes and helps maintain my working kitchen. It frees up time for me to spend with my kids or on the more important pieces of my business.
Start your Home-Based Baking business today!
For more ideas on how you can start your own side job hustles and legitimate business opportunities, check out my other article on the 9+ Best Side Jobs for Busy Moms.
You can make good money by following your passion to have an in-home-based bakery!
What a great story Jasmine, thank you for the opportunity to interview you. I know that your story will encourage many to step out in faith to follow their passion for baking!
Let me know if you found this helpful and encouraging! I know I did. She has been a huge inspiration to many in the DFW area!
The important thing is to understand that it’s the smaller mundane steps that lead to the giant larger steps to success!
It will take some hard work, determination, well-thought-out plans, financial literacy, funds, and patience. But the payoffs are huge if you are consistent and do not give up!
