The Sweet Life Bakery

[gfron1]

They are available to businesses as small as single store low revenue ones, but when you weigh the delays, additional burden and administrative costs, we found that for our $250K loan, it cost us in the long run versus having a higher upfront payment. I would never recommend an SBA loan for any business of less than a half a million in annual gross...and would suggest that they are best for the $1M businesses. Just my opinion.

[ohmyganache]

The area that we are opening the business is in a federally designated Empowerment Zone... so we're getting our loan through the Cumberland Empowerment Zone (Cumberland is the county we're in). They get thier funding in conjunction with the Urban Enterprise Zone. I'm not exactly sure what the scope the UEZ is... not sure if it's only in New Jersey or if it's federal. What this boils down to is that the area that the bakery will be in is targeted for redevelopment, so there is money to be lended out at low rates to favorable businesses. Our bakery seems like a wonderful fit for the city's vision for the future, so we're getting support from the city, county, and state.

Because there are so many government agencies involved, it's taking a long time... longer than we anticipated and longer than he hoped. Fortunatley, our landord is being super cool about the delays... although the same can not be said for the previous tennant and our real estate agents. But as we keep telling them, they're just going to have to wait like we are.

We moved into an office today that is located across the street from the bakery. We're quite excited about this, it'll help us stay organized and it's big enough to use for storage of dry goods and paper products as well.

[gfron1]

Just checking in...

[Shelby]

Yeah, I'm hanging out here waiting for updates

[gfron1]

My guess is they're knee deep in flour...but for all of us living vicariously, look what I just found: THEIR WEBPAGE! Woo hoo - it looks great! I just read more closely - this weekend was their Grand Opening.

[rooftop1000]

Oh the square black and white wedding cake is Hot

tracey

[prasantrin]

I was looking at their blog (only two posts there), and their grand opening was Oct. 27. I almost wish I lived in New Jersey!

[ohmyganache]

Hello folks. I feel like I say this every time I get on, but sorry I haven't written in so long! I'm sure everyone knows how much work it is to open and run a little bakery... but man, it really is a lot of work!!! The sad thing is that I don't get internet reception in the bakery, and I can't exactly justify sending the money on an internet connection at the moment. More important bills to pay... food, labor, gas, electric, marketing, my God there are so many checks to write. It's pretty crazy the amount of money that flows in and then flows right back out! We've been good at keeping a little extra in the checking account from all that cash flow, but we've still got a long way to go until I'm comfortable with the financial situation.

Check out this e-mail I just got from a customer...

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"Hi Sweet Life,

I'm writing to let you know about what my entire office thought about a birthday cake we ordered from you in November. We ordered a white cake filled with chocolate ganache and chocolate buttercream icing for one of the girls at work. When I came and picked it up, it was so pretty! You put orange leaves on it and some little details since it was right before Thanksgiving and the "Happy Birthday" you wrote on it was done beautifully. When I picked up the box that it was in, I couldn't believe how heavy it was! LOL

When I got back to the office, I had to weigh the cake out of curiosity. I made everyone in the office lift the box and guess what it weighed. It weighed over 5 lbs.!! We always get a cake for everyones birthday at my office and we usually just settle for a crappy supermarket cake. But, I had been in your bakery once before and bought some yummy goodies and thought we'd give you a try for a cake. What a great idea that turned out to be! The cake was absolutely delicious!!! The icing was something we've never tasted before! I mean, obviously your icing is what icing is supposed to taste like and we loved it!! The cake was moist and so good that we all had trouble describing how much we liked it. We knew at that moment that we could NEVER again settle for a crappy supermarket cake!

So, with all that being said, you have definitely gained our business for future birthday cakes and any other yummy goodies we want!!! I wish you much success in your business and I look forward to doing business with you soon! (we have a xmas party in a couple weeks and we have another birthday coming up at the end of the month)

P.S. We've been telling everyone we know about your bakery!!! The best advertisement is customer referrals!!!

Thank you,

Renee

(manager for QC Labs in Vineland)"

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Oh that made my day!

If anyone has any questions, please ask... I'll try my hardest to reply. Remember though, it is December...

-Stephen

[rooftop1000]

Real icing makes life worth living Sorry we arent closer to you but I did try our new local bakery last weekend....just say no to supermarket crisco "buttercream"...

Good Luck

think I'll go finish that cake

tracey