By Nicola Brown
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| Photo by @nuffcookieja on Instagram |
“But what is it that you see yourself doing? What are you passionate about?”
“I loovvveee baking. I could bake all day, every day and it not feel like work.”
This was just one instance of this conversation with my 16 year-old step-daughter. This conversation had previously taken place many times, in many different scenarios, but always circled back to the same conclusion, she absolutely, positively, no doubts, no questions needed, loved baking.
So on this particular Saturday, while I was helping her to package her cookies for a community sale, it suddenly hit me how much she was actually teaching me about entrepreneurship. Off the top, there were 5 very obvious lessons:
Identify and Pursue your Passion
As the old saying goes, ‘find what you love to do and you’ll never work a day in your life’. At 16, to already know that you are this passionate about something was already admirable. And having the guts to pursue that passion and present that into the world, for scrutiny or acceptance also takes a lot of guts. And so having that confidence and belief that you can do ‘this’ (whatever this is) is very important. But still, even while having that confidence, she has acknowledged the importance of getting feedback. So what did she do?
Ask for Feedback from Day 1
In this instance, she made a batch of cookies – a free sample, Oreo Cookie Crumble if I’m recalling correctly – and gave them to me to share with my team mates at work. What was the result of this? Two things, firstly, she was able to get feedback, which she then used to tweak or enhance elements of her cookie creations. Secondly, in this process, she pretty much was able to start wooing potential customers, laying the foundation for them to want to purchase from her in he future.
Start with whatever is available
Now throughout this process, she hasn’t incurred any massive overhead because she was creative enough to use the ingredients at hand. Even in instances where she didn’t have all the ideal ingredients, she found alternatives and kept on testing to see if they worked well. Even for her first community sale, the cookies were literally placed in a container and covered and for anyone making a purchase, it was uncovered and placed in paper towel. Far from ideal, yes, but from that first instance, a few persons started making orders. This brings me to another lesson.
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| Photo by Garrhet Sampson on Unsplash |
Be deliberate in finding your target
Having that passion is a start but it’s not enough. If you’re serious about turning your passion into your income, you need to be deliberate and persistent in order to monetize your passion. In this case, she went out and literally knocked door to door, with cookies in hand, in order to make the sale. Of course some persons said no and some persons even questioned the pricing but she got them sold. And from each interaction she had some type of take-away, whether it was about other types of cookies persons were interested in, the frequency in which she should sell, how to tweak her sales pitch, the pricing model…every interaction had a lesson. After each sale, she’d come back with her team (yes, she has a team) and they’d talk about what transpired and the plan for the next sale day.
Get some help
The truth is that everybody needs help. You may not think it’s ideal, especially when you’re just starting out, but you need to find trusted people who understand the vision and can help you in the process. And make sure you are clear on your compensation packages. In this case, there’s a 50%/25%/25% split, of course, the 50% going to the baker.
It’s been fun watching her business evolve and it’s also eye-opening to see how ready she is to adapt. It’s things even as little as adjusting how many cookies are baked on a given day, so that instead of having too many done and not enough sold, another batch can be made on another day. It’s also been a lot of her figuring out how to play with supply and demand, but she's been doing an awesome job and I look forward to see how far she’ll take this.
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