Today we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Griffin.
Hi Nicole, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I grew up in Chicago and played ice hockey and decided to go to The University of Connecticut for college. While studying there I realized my heart was not in Nutritional Sciences, which was my major at the time.
My family moved down here to Savannah when I went away to Connecticut, so when I talked to my family they did research and found Savannah Technical College down here and the amazing Culinary Program they provided. I came home for winter break and visited the college and fell in love.
I started there the next semester. I got both a degree in Baking and Pastry and Culinary Arts. While at Savannah Tech, I was lucky enough to be chosen to study abroad in Tarbes, France for a month, it was an amazing and eye-opening experience!
I started working downtown as a Pastry Cook and eventually worked my way up to Pastry Chef and then covid hit and I was laid off. While being off from work, my husband and I decided it was time to think about starting a family and that is what we did. I gave birth to my son in January of 2021.
I was back working downtown, part-time, and decided I needed a change. I knew the previous owners of Smallcakes and they decided they wanted to move to be my family and were looking to sell. At this point, I was 25, a stay-at-home mom with a newborn, working a few hours a week just to get out of the house. I did not feel even close to being prepared to run my own business.
Talking it over with my family members, husband, and friends, it seemed like I was the only one with doubt. It made me feel so supported to have these people rooting for me so I jumped in. Found a daycare for my child, and if anyone has children, they know how much of a struggle that is right now, made a business plan, went to banks, talked to colleagues, and a couple of months later, bought Smallcakes.
We started in late October 2021 and are still going strong today! We have a small but mighty crew of 3 and want to put smiles on everyone’s faces as they walk through our front door. We create everything from cupcakes, ice cream, custom cakes, wedding cakes, and dessert bars, to bread and specialty holiday items.
We want to cater as much as we can to our amazing customers! We want everyone to feel like family because that is what we are.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has been a learning curve, to say the least.
When I was offered to buy the business, I hadn’t been working for a year, and my husband and I just bought a house. To try to get a loan to purchase the business was difficult. I was lucky enough to have a very close family member act as an investor and help us secure the business.
Since, opening under new ownership, it has had some struggles for us as well as our customers. We changed the menu which made a few regulars angry but after trying our new products a lot of them have returned and we love seeing their faces.
Another struggle has been this economy. Buying a business in the middle of the Covid pandemic was a lot. People were low on money, not spending other than needed on essentials, and not a lot of people think cupcakes are essential foods-haha! We do our best to bring people in the door.
Birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, and other holidays still go on no matter what is going on in our economy. We like to be a part of any special occasion people are going through and try to let our prices be the best they can be in this economy.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Smallcakes Cupcakery and Creamery?
We are a specialty cupcake and ice cream bakery. We made all of our cupcakes in-house daily and have 12-15 different varieties. We have fun flavors like Cookies and Cream, Strawberry, and Key Lime but, also offer a Vanilla cupcake for those who just are just craving a single Vanilla cupcake.
We also made ice cream in-house. We have 10 different flavors of ice creams, they are hard ice cream but with a gelato consistency. Customers are welcome to come in and sample our flavors.
We also do custom orders and those range from mini cupcakes, decorated sugar cookies, wedding cakes, dessert tables, and pretty much anything you think of, we would be glad to help make your visions come true.
We may have cupcakes and creamery in our name but we do so much more than just that. We love to try and accommodate our customer’s needs the best we can. Smallcakes is a national franchise, but we are all separately owned and it makes each Smallcakes location similar but unique in our own way.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.smallcakessq.com/
- Instagram: @smallcakessavannahquarters
