{"id":40880,"date":"2019-07-12T10:30:42","date_gmt":"2019-07-12T14:30:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/?p=40880"},"modified":"2021-04-23T16:50:56","modified_gmt":"2021-04-23T20:50:56","slug":"janie-cakes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/janie-cakes\/","title":{"rendered":"This Texas Bakery Makes 26,000 Poundcakes a Year – and Survived a Vanilla Bust"},"content":{"rendered":"

Running a bakery<\/a> that makes just one item — a Bundt-shaped pound cake — is not as simple as it might sound.<\/p>\n

Janie Clapp, a baker by training, has been operating Janie\u2019s Cakes<\/a> since 1987 in Tyler, Texas. Daughter Katherine Crow became her official business partner<\/a> 10 years ago. They make 26,000 poundcakes a year, in a variety of sizes with different fillings, enjoying busy seasons like the holidays and Mother\u2019s Day. Annual revenue is $750,000.<\/p>\n

But the tricky part, which might not be obvious to, say, the local Texan who scarfs down a slice of cake, is securing the same premium ingredients on a consistent basis. All the cakes are made with farm-fresh eggs, creamery butter and real cane sugar, and filled with things like rich buttercream icing or topped with toasted pecans.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are very particular about our ingredients,\u201d Clapp says. \u201cMy product tastes a certain way and bakes a certain way — I\u2019m not willing to fudge.\u201d In recent years, maintaining Janie\u2019s Cakes\u2019 baking essentials has been impacted by everything from severe weather to factory explosions. \u201cUnexpected surprises add another level of challenge in terms of maintaining our own standards,\u201d Crow says.<\/p>\n

[Related: Check out these advice and tips for women entrepreneurs<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n

Stockpiling \u2018Liquid Gold\u2019<\/h5>\n

Case in point: Vanilla. A world away from East Texas, farmers on the island of Madagascar off the coast of Africa produce an estimated 80% of the world\u2019s supply of vanilla. A cyclone tore through the island in 2017, uprooting vines and triggering a sudden increase in the spice\u2019s price. \u201cAll of a sudden it goes from a hundred and something dollars to $400 a gallon,\u201d Clapp recalls.<\/p>\n

Clapp and Crow say they were almost instantly notified about the cyclone situation from their supplier. After that, it was all-hands-on-deck in Tyler. \u201cWhatever our priorities at the bakeries were,\u201d Crow says, \u201cit immediately went into a halt.\u201d They quickly started researching other companies that sold the same type of all-natural vanilla in volume, hoping to secure gallons of the spice at fair market value, before prices rose. They succeeded.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the vanilla bust came, we had purchased enough vanilla to get us through 14 months of production,\u201d Crow says. \u201cWe sat on it.\u201d In the months that followed, the two would joke \u201c\u2018we need a safe — this liquid gold is nerve-wracking!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

As a baker, Clapp says she was completely unwilling to use much cheaper artificial vanilla. \u201cNo, no, no,\u201d she says. (Her preferred brand is Nielsen-Massey, which she says is \u201cfabulous.\u201d) And as a business, Crow adds that Janie\u2019s Kitchen wanted to maintain prices. If the cost of your supplies soars, \u201cyou either eat the cost or raise the price — and those are two areas we hope to avoid,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

[Related: Listen to our podcast about starting a snack company<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n

Weathering the Storms<\/h5>\n

Throughout the years, Clapp and Crow have weathered other storms, both literally and figuratively. In recent memory, a Louisiana factory exploded while making powdered sugar (it\u2019s highly combustible), triggering a shortage that they\u2019re still dealing with. The price of butter goes up and down, as does cocoa, whose production is impacted by drought and warming climates. Flour, fortunately, remains somewhat consistent.<\/p>\n

Crow handles forecasting for Janie\u2019s Kitchen, generally using the slower summer months to analyze reports from the company\u2019s database. She then alerts suppliers as to how much they\u2019ll need of a certain product, per month. She\u2019s currently looking ahead to the Christmas holiday season. \u201cAll that information can be transferred to our vendors, so we all have expectations and guidelines,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Clapp and Crow says aspiring entrepreneurs in the food business should work with experienced suppliers who can help manage sudden shortages or temporary price increases. \u201cTypically, we work with companies that have really great sales reps or companies that really care about customer service,\u201d Crow says. They use bigger suppliers like Ben E. Keith and a number of smaller vendors.  \u201cThey immediately inform us and notify us, because they know how important it is to us to maintain the quality.\u201d<\/p>\n

While vendors are \u201chelping us look for Plans C, D and E, we do our own experiments,\u201d Crow says. For instance, they recently tried making pound cakes using powdered sugar made from beets, which some bakers have converted to. It didn\u2019t pass muster. \u201cThe flavor is different,\u201d Clapp says. \u201cI\u2019ll be so glad when this plant is back up.\u201d<\/p>\n

After so many years in the food business, Clapp is pragmatic about dealing with shortages. \u201cSo much of life is problem solving,\u201d she says. When something like a vanilla bust happens, \u201cyou get busy and solve the problem.”<\/p>\n

[Related: Read a full profile of Janie’s Cakes here<\/a>.]<\/em><\/p>\n

\r\n
\r\n\t\tRead Full Transcript<\/i><\/span><\/a>\r\n\t\t
\r\n\t\t\t

Katherine: A lot of new customers come in and they ask, \u201cAre you Janie?\u201d And I'll go, \u201cNo, I'm not Janie.\u201d And then the next question is, \u201cSo, is there a Janie?\u201d \u201cYes, of course there's a Janie! Would you like to meet her?\u201d<\/p>\n

Janie: Usually I have my hairnet on or something, and they're like, \u201cAnd you're baking?\u201d I'm like, \u201cYes, I'm back here baking!\u201d<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie Clapp \u2013 Founder, Janie\u2019s Cakes \u2013 Tyler, Texas<\/p>\n

Katherine: At Janie's Cakes we make an old-fashioned pound cake. And the tagline that we use on a regular basis is that we want you to spread a little kindness one cake at a time.<\/p>\n

SOT: We went to high school together, that\u2019s how much we love each other.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie and her daughter Katherine have lived all their lives in Tyler, surrounded by a large extended family.<\/p>\n

Janie: My great-grandmother, she would get me in the kitchen and she'd go, \u201cJane. Let's learn how to bake. I want you to learn all the chemistry, what works, what doesn't.\u201d And then she'd go, \u201cWell, do you know why this didn't work? Do you know why it fell or why it tastes awful?\u201d And so, she taught me all the chemistry behind the baking.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Throughout school, Janie baked for family and friends. At Texas Christian University, she studied art, focusing on ceramics and sculpture.<\/p>\n

TEXT: In 1973 she married Matt Clapp, a local rancher. <\/p>\n

Janie: After we married, my nieces and nephew came into the picture. And I was like, \u201cYou don't want a sheet cake for your birthday? You want a tennis shoe or something sculpted?\u201d So before I knew it, my husband had engaged me with other people. \u201cSure, Jane would love to make your son a birthday cake.\u201d And before I knew it, it evolved into this business.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie set up her company in 1987. She soon outgrew her home kitchen.<\/p>\n

Janie: I started looking around for buildings that I could rent or buy. So, I went to the bank. Because I had always banked with a certain bank and my family had, my husband's family had, they knew me. And so they were like, \u201cOkay.\u201d<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie borrowed $80,000 to buy a building and equipment.<\/p>\n

Janie: I started making wedding cakes for all these people that I had grown up with and knew in Tyler.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Katherine was born in 1983. She spent much of her childhood in the bakery.<\/p>\n

Katherine: Much like Janie, I really did love cooking. And part of that was learning skills as it went along. Like, she might be making a flower or something and I would make a flower and put it on my creation.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Katherine worked full time at the bakery through college. They were making wedding cakes that fed up to 1,000 people--at $15 a slice.<\/p>\n

Janie: The sculpt-a-cake business and the wedding cake business, it was loads of fun. But it's also very intense, because I used fresh ingredients, did everything at the very last minute, everything we made from scratch. And it was just so time consuming. And of course, nobody really wants to get married on a weekday! It\u2019s always on the weekend! We ended up traveling all over Texas delivering cakes. And so we would get home late Saturday and just kind of crash. And I\u2019m like, \u201cOkay, I want my weekends back.\u201d<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie and Katherine stopped making wedding cakes and began making simpler pound cakes.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Katherine took the company online. She became a partner in the business in 2009.<\/p>\n

Katherine: You're looking for a birthday cake that you can mail, or you need a thank you gift. We're at that click of a button.<\/p>\n

Janie: She's very tech savvy, yes.<\/p>\n

Katherine: I don't know that I would give myself that much credit.<\/p>\n

Janie: Yes, yes, I would.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Janie\u2019s Cakes has 7 employees and sells about 26,000 cakes a year. <\/p>\n

Janie: Weather is a huge factor. Just when you're just rocking along and then all of a sudden, oh, no kidding. A hurricane, that affects production for the company that we buy our vanilla from. And so, all of a sudden it goes from $100-something to $400 a gallon. So that's a challenge.<\/p>\n

TEXT: Annual revenues are close to $750,000 a year. \t <\/p>\n

Janie: It sounds pretty nutty and I guess nerdy, but still, when I take the pans off the cakes, I'm hoping that each one is going to be perfect. There's still something about that. There's just something about it. The smell. The steam. The cake. It's a pound cake, but it's a pretty darn perfect cake.<\/p>\n<\/p>\r\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\r\n\t<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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