We’ve Gone Down the Brownie Route… Meet Bakerz Collective

We have officially gone down the brownie route.

Bakerz Collective is our latest venture, and like a lot of things in business, it started because I spotted an opportunity and could immediately see where it could fit.

We already have Foxxy Foods, our food truck, which is doing well and getting stronger all the time. I also have a perfectly good kitchen at The Chester Townhouse which, once breakfast is finished, is largely sitting there doing very little, and that has always bothered us.

A commercial kitchen costs money whether it is being used or not, so from a business point of view I have always looked at it and thought: what else can we make happen in here after 11am?

Then this opportunity came up.

The business had previously traded as Cheshire Bakes, and when I saw it was available I could instantly see the potential. There was already a good product and a recipe people loved, but I felt there was an opportunity to give it a new identity, push the brand further and turn it into something with real room to grow.

So we bought it, and Bakerz Collective was born.

The concept is pretty simple. We are selling boxes of six brownies online, alongside boxes of blondies, all handmade at The Chester Townhouse. We have kept the original Cheshire Bakes recipe at the heart of what we are doing because there is no point changing something just for the sake of it, but we are also starting to put our own stamp on it with new flavours, including a lemon curd blondie which I have to say is very, very good.

The plan is not just to sell online either.

We already have the advantage of having our own hospitality businesses where we can put the product directly in front of customers, including the deli at Queen’s Square Social and the brownies are on the dessert menu at The Savvy Fox Pub too.

We also hope to get Bakerz onto Deliveroo in Chester & Wrexham in the future too, and we want to get out to markets and shows, and ultimately we want to build a brand that people actually recognise when they think of brownies.

That sounds simple when you write it down.

It isn't.

Like every new business, there is far more going on behind the scenes than anybody ever sees. Branding, packaging, boxes, flavours, pricing, photography, websites, stock, suppliers, social media, where you are going to sell, how much you make, how much you need to sell and then the small matter of actually getting people to buy it.

You can have the nicest logo in the world, but eventually somebody has to hand over money for the product.

That is the test. Taste is everything!

As this blog goes out, we are heading to our first big scale event The Baby & Toddler Show in Manchester with Bakerz Collective.

Our aim?

Hopefully around 1,000 brownies a day.

No pressure.

And this is the bit of starting a business that I actually enjoy.

You can sit around a table for months talking about plans, ideas, branding and projections, but eventually you have to put the product in front of real people and see what happens.

Will they stop at the stand?

Will they try one?

Will they buy a box?

Will they remember Bakerz Collective afterwards?

We are about to find out.

I think that is also why I am so excited about this business. Everything feels like it has fallen into place for a reason.

We had a kitchen with spare capacity.

We found a business with a good product and untapped potential.

We already had venues where we could start selling it.

And we already understand the reality of getting a food product out there because of what we have learned with Foxxy Foods.

None of that guarantees success.

There are plenty of great ideas that never become great businesses.

But it gives us a very good starting point.

The next stage is getting Bakerz Collective out there, learning what people love, trying new flavours, getting ourselves into more venues, markets and events and hopefully becoming a proper name in the brownie world.

We are still working behind the scenes getting ready to be able to offer online delivery services of the brownies but if you're round wrexham please come to our venues to try our new brownies!

Also give us a follow on instagram too

We are really excited to see where Bakerz Collective can go from here.