MARYSVILLE – When Erin Reynolds was a little girl growing up in Yakima, she used to love baking with her grandma.
Now she is giving up her job as manager at Coastal Community Bank to start an at-home business called “Sweet Bites.”
Grandma Dorothy McCafferty also ran a baking business at home.
“It was so much fun to bake with her,” Reynolds said, smiling at the memory. “Her outlook was – if people’s tummies are full… that brought her happiness.”
Reynolds learned from the best. In 1969, grandma McCafferty had 29 entries in the Central Washington Fair. She won each one, earning her the title, “Queen of the Kitchen.” So Reynolds must be “Princess of the Kitchen.”
Anyway, Reynolds’ mom and aunt were not into baking. “They said I got the (baking) gene from my grandma as it skipped over them,” Reynolds said, adding when her grandma died she got her Wilton pans and other baking stuff.
She has been baking ever since. She would make desserts for her son’s sports banquets. She enjoyed getting compliments from parents. “What I like most about it is people’s reactions,” she said.
Then she started baking for events for family and friends, such as weddings, holidays like Valentine’s Day and Christmas, birthdays, baby showers, retirements, etc. “It was a side fun thing,” she said, adding customer favorites are her chocolate-peanut butter cupcakes. The most-difficult dessert she ever made was for a retirement party. It had to have a “woodsy theme, and it was all edible,” – even the Forest Service sign.
At the bank she’s called, “The Snack Mom.” She wouldn’t just bring chips and pop. She would make desserts with people’s names on them. “I would go overboard,” she admitted.
Reynolds pays as much attention to the presentation as the baking. “Nothing gets out of here that doesn’t look as good as it tastes,” she said.
What makes her baking rise to the top compared to others is her attention to detail. She listens to customers and will match colors and flavors they want. “I can tailor it to the event,” she said, because her business is small. As an example, she made patriotic cookies for Mark James when he ran for Marysville City Council. Others who have used her work include Red Curtain, the Rotary Auction and the Chamber dinner. Country Coffee in Darrington is a regular customer.
Sweet Bites is so small that it is called a “Cottage Kitchen,” not regulated by the health department, but by the Department of Agriculture. As such, she cannot use commercial equipment. She cannot do mail order. And she can only bake and sell items on recipes that have been approved by the DOA. Plus, she can only make up to $25,000 a year by baking.
Once her business was approved, “Things have blown up since then.”
In December, she would get up at 4 a.m. and bake, drive to work at the bank from her home in Darrington, then bake again when she got home until midnight.
She also baked on weekends. “I was so busy I didn’t know how to function,” she said. “I really didn’t have Christmas.”
That is when she decided to give up her day job. “It was time to take a leap of faith. I may fall on my face trying…”
Along with cupcakes and cakes she makes sugar and sandwich cookies, tarts, pies, candies, dessert bars and more.
Kinder Smoots came by the bank at Reynolds’ going-away party Wednesday. She has hired her to bake items for various events.
“I have never been disappointed in any of Erin’s yummy goodies,” she said.
Reynolds has been asked if she is going to open a storefront. “I don’t need to. Social media is so huge now,” she said, adding she uses Instagram, but most of her business comes via Facebook.
Reynolds said starting a blog is “super crucial” for her future success. She needs to venture away from baking to make more money so she hopes to teach classes, write a cookbook and maybe even sell ads for her blog.
One of the major problems with her “Cottage Kitchen” business is not being able to mail items. So she’s always looking for ways to get her desserts to customers. She once met a customer in Everett who lives in Eastern Washington. If she’s baking a wedding cake, she will ask if anyone nearby is going to the wedding.
Even though her business is small, she’s productive.
“I can crank out the cupcakes like nobody’s business at this point,” she said. “I know my KitchenAid stove.”
Contact
Phone: 360-631-1809
Facebook: SWEETBITESERIN
