tablespoon.bakery

Today's Topics Vacation Dinner The Usual Interview Anecdotes Vacation It took thirteen months and 7 days for us to close the bakery and take a vacation. So we closed for ten days. Two of those days I still had to work to fulfill orders (under protest). I suppose it is already over because today I did the shopping and I made the Living Whole Burgers and Living Whole Buddha Balls (they are baking as I type). Yesterday was my birthday, which I made sure fell inside of the "on vacation" window. In the morning we went for a lovely walk in Playa de Muro. Photos... Dinner For the afternoon, I literally did my best to do nothing. I slept, I relaxed, and did nothing. Then, our two amazingly lovely, beautiful, kind, sweet, amazing friends Kathryn and David took us to Villa Vegana for dinner. What a beautiful, relaxing, peaceful evening. The food was amazing. The owners are amazing. The animals are amazing. And of course, the company was outstanding. Photos in no particular ord...

Who would think I could be sitting here, at 7PM, exhausted more than I ever have been, but smiling and writing this blog post? Certainly not me!! If I had a euro for every time I thought we would fail, close, give up, or run away, I probably could fund a business.... all of those things are true. Are they part of being a business owner? Is this normal? As we began to celebrate our first year anniversary, we made a couple of changes to our menu, we are selling burgers (Living Whole Burger as named by the two most amazing people we now call family - I’ll explain more in a moment), and making smoothies. These two things I fought for a long time but now I see they are our gateway drugs to wellness, kindness, inclusion, growth, and change. CHANGE... change is the most important ingredient we must all have to success in life. We must be willing to see what we can do differently, in order to grow. Staying in the same place but expecting things to change will not do it for sure! ... About six...

And what a journey it has become!!! I don’t know what to say or where to direct my energy in this blog entry. Some of the content is a repeat of what I’ve said many times and some maybe different. The bakery continues to struggle to meet the ends and while there are more customers it does not seem to change many of the outcomes. I spend time looking at the costs versus the income and I see little in terms of gaps that can be tightened. Really... I want to give up! I want to close the doors and never look back. We were closed last week for multiple reasons, including the installation of an air conditioner. I felt it was absolutely necessary to have colder air when it starts getting hot outside. We were also supposed to do a festival on Sunday, but when I found out it was more about marketing than making money I decided against it. Yes, marketing would help, but I would have had to buy a table and then invest in the foods with my fingers crossed that I would sell everything. So, such is...

Ok, I do not have any April Fools jokes.. I made one a year ago and it backfired. I actually lost a couple of friends as a result (they did not like my humor)... The bakery is picking up a bit. It is not yet to where we are breaking even, but my hope is the warmer weather is a good start. We have had the tables open a couple of days and when the weather really breaks, we will try to have them up most days. I also think that one night a week we will do something different, like a burger and fries night, a sushi night, or pizza, etc. Just to get some people coming in to keep the good energy flowing. Also, I am working on some physical changes in the bakery. We will remove two of the round tables after I build three new square ones. They will take up less space and we can then offer more seating. We bought some chairs at a second hand place and Sandy is painting them and putting new covers on them. It is a nice feeling when we are completely full and people have to stand, or get tak...

In a few days, tablespoon bakery will be open for 7 months, the 6th to be specific.  A milestone I suppose.... Over the last 20 days since the last post some things have been happening, so I will dive in with a little detail. .... Lets talk about support.... What occurs to me is when people offer to help you, I am not sure they really mean it. I do not want to generalize, so I am speaking specifically about the bakery. In my life, I take nothing for free. I have a strange quirk about me where it is extremely hard to accept gifts from people. One person offered me financial support monthly and I said no. Unless that person was getting something in return for that money, there is just no way I would accept it. Other people (many actually) told me to do a go fund me page or something similar to raise money, but again, this is a give without get and I do not like that. So, I came up with the idea of t shirts. Many people said it sounds like a great idea, and I thought, ok, I will get a lit...

We are six months and change into the bakery... it is more than a roller coaster. I tell you, when I walk into a small business, I think to myself, anyone can do it.. then, I open a small business, and realize, like most things, a business is like an iceberg... and wow is it ever. Now, combine that with the notion that Inca is as quiet as a mouse in January and February, and you find yourself in times of must stress.. ok, maybe not you, but certainly me. Wednesday, we did not sell a single croissant. This is the nature of the beast... So, congratulations to us for lasting this long... and I segue into ... we are selling t-shirts... honestly, the cost is very high so we will not really make much money at all with them, but, I like the idea of selling them, they look nice (my design, thank you very much), and really, it keeps my mind off the very quiet days. So be sure to shop early to fill your 2019 christmas orders  .... hehe... click here Thank you so much for sticking with me.. I lov...