Artisan Bakery - Unfolding mystery in Bangladesh

Walking on the street, passing over an old time European bakery store, looking through the baked goodies into wooden shelves. You get into the front door and there is your love of life around every corner smiling towards you! Who won't tumble over the smell of freshly baked goodies coming straight from the oven and gets into the rack. It gets even better with a piece of bread with cheese and jam; a glass of wine. It seems like a perfect treat of any morning, at least for me!

This is what I have cherished myself, but the reality was completely disdaining. Riding the most unknown piece of art in a country where more than 90% of the generation doesn't have any idea, can be a tricky task to accomplish.The country cherishes every single day by the undefined happiness of having delicious savory cuisines.

The species have been mastered as the core ingredient of our food culture has been followed for hundreds of years. Understandably, the prospect of this culinary food art and to introduce to people has been quite challenging. We love baking, we love the smell of baked goodies. There is nothing you can compare while having freshly baked bread with cheese and herbs. Essence of artisan baking has only captivated and inspired to go ahead and be ourselves.

Customize Boutique Bakery was not an idealistic choice in Bangladesh. Not more than 10% people know of what artisan bakery is all about. We have seen the expression by the people is like "what's artisan bakery and why its different than any other regular bakery outlets around the cities?". Being a foodie, we believed in our passion.

Working as professionals in Dentistry and Finance lecturer in a private university, the only reason we continued working on the project was nothing but a self portrait of what we want. We didn't set any goal of achieving million of dollars over a year. We wanted to present something that has not been regulated or introduced towards mass people in the history of our country. That’s how our journey began in the land of savories where spice is becomes a norm of food delicacies. Living and working at the capital city of Bangladesh “Dhaka”, every entrepreneur knows the potential market. Introducing a food business can be alluring yet you should have determination, patience and most importantly a good mindset for every footstep.

Being self trained bakers, we found the reality quite inexplicable. Due to financially unstable, we found the one and only alternative would be following the world known artisan bakers and take their words as blessings. Videos, stock image recipe tutorials have kept us going for a while.

Innovations and eagerness to make believe that we could do better have been an inspirational note. My partner loves baking and she has been doing for last 9 years while working on her other jobs. We took the initiative just like “going with the flow and see how it works”.

Thinking of a name from where we would build a platform, the answer was quite easy. My partner has been called as "Puni" by her siblings and she used to bake a lot for them. Thus, she got the kitchen named as “Punizz Kitchen” and its how the journey began in January 26, 2013. Finding a base and exhibit the excellence of boutique artisan bakery had kept us going!

Being a small entrepreneur, monetary issue will always be a major concern. We started our small boutique bakery with 400$ in hand. The amount was nothing comparing to the needs we had. We had nothing to lose but to go for a convincing way to exhibit and promote the baked goodies. It didn’t take much of a time when we realized the best way of targeting our potential customers was to show the premises through social media, more specifically Facebook. Things we did -

• Create a Facebook Page. Put all the details like what we offer and how we work.
• The premises like our existing photos of baked goodies or custom designed cakes.
• Using Facebook Ad at times to create reach towards the viewers who have given "Likes" to our page.

The idea was even more realistic in terms of expense. The immense potential of online marketing and capacity of reaching people quicker than any other available platform. There was Pros and cons of using social media. Distrust is something we can't change within a day. It took months after getting referred by the clients we delivered products and their appreciations.

Expectation from potential clients had encouraged us to take things on serious note. The second step was to look for the available supplies of ingredients. The outcome was utterly disappointing and discouraging eventually. Shortage of products and the distrust among the suppliers had been the major barrier and the only thing we didn't have was "Brand Name". When we started working as an online bakery store in Bangladesh, there were only 4-5 fellow ones around the market. We never thought, branding would become a turning factor for not getting the things we needed every day.

Time passed through and the number of home bakers increased in immense number. We have been a major factor or somewhat inspirational feature to motivate the newbies. The community is now expanded and the percentage of supplies got much better than previous years.

Being a starter in any entrepreneurship, first few months becomes quite tricky as people takes time to believe in workmanship. Venturing an artisan bakery, the products we would refer to the clients seemed expensive and at times outrageous. Explaining the reason behind the expenses comparing with regular bakeries turned out as a regular norm. Most of them wouldn’t understand and used to show their disbelief over the prospect. It was difficult to see the negativity amongst the people, but we had to overcome those situations and moved ahead.

It took almost 7-8 months when we were able to start designing custom design cakes. They were unique and absolute uncommon towards people. Seeing the expression with disbelief in eyes like they have never seen or imagined. The appreciation started flowing and we were lucky enough to work on some exciting designs over the months. We stayed focused and continued to push ourselves to create something spectacular.

Communication and trust became the major concern after working for months with the suppliers. Initially, the story would roam around the clients but it sorted out better by positive reviews from the clients. Issues we couldn't ignore -

• Inadequate working space and shortage of people.
• Lack of ingredients supply.
• Suppliers distrust over the online bakeries and home bakers.
• Shortage of suppliers to deliver foreign goodies.

We have tried showing true potential of the market on how they could attract and exhibit their supplies to hundreds of home bakers and online bakeries. It took a while but we managed receiving their attention gradually. We felt, a better platform would be a major step towards the branding we were looking for months.

Running an online bakery and working through home, we always knew the time would come for building the long awaited kitchen studio. The entire project was pretty expensive. Planning for the future and eagerness to explore, we had to make a deal towards the physical identity. Even after toiling hard for months, we haven’t had enough financial resource to building a suitable kitchen studio. So many new things we needed to know and understand. Few months of extreme phases, we were able to establish a kitchen studio of our own. It truly felt like a home for us and its hard to describe in words how it felt and how we managed to set something of our own.

It has been 8 months since we have established the kitchen studio. We had to upgrade many things with the days passed by. The start has been promising and more people started believing in our professionalism. We have been pushing ourselves to overcome the situations in past couple of year. From 2013 to 2015, we have outgrown and established a strong platform to be a professional artisan bakery in Bangladesh. Still a long way to go but we are pretty happy with the stats. There will be hardship, negativity, failures over the days, but we will rise above the quest one day...