Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in food and beverage but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Stacy W, CEO of Boba Works, located in Linwood, NJ.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
At Boba Works, we specialize in Asian baked goods and desserts along with our namesake, Boba Tea. Boba Tea, or bubble tea as some may know it, is a tea-based cold beverage originating from Taiwan. The boba part of its name refers to the tapioca pearls accompanying each boba tea. We’re in the shop baking fresh goods from scratch every day (that we’re open). One of our goals is to introduce new and exciting ingredients and flavors that our community isn’t used to. Some examples include black sesame mousse cakes, ube cream puffs, Taiwanese pineapple cakes, Thai tea panna cotta, and matcha tiramisu. We’re always trying to surprise our patrons. One such surprise of note was when we secured a shipment of matcha from Shizuoka Prefecture in Japan.
Like most businesses, we want to make everyone feel welcomed. We’re fortunate enough to have a supportive and energetic community. They’ve always been on board to try out all our experiments and collaborate with us. I think we have a good relationship.
Tell us about yourself
No, thank you . . . Just kidding! I’ve been baking for half my life now. That’s 50%! Baking has always been my passion. After high school, I decided to pursue that very passion. I went to a local culinary school and graduated valedictorian. I’ll explain at the end, but that last part doesn’t really matter. I then went on to obtain a business degree from Rutgers University. After that, you’ll never guess what I did! I went back to baking! But we’re not at present-day yet, it’ll take several more years before Boba Works even became a thought. Do you really want to know what I was up to between then? Well, I guess you can just keep reading on. My professional career really started taking off when I was a pastry cook in NY. (Yeah, you got to start somewhere kids!) It was exciting to be in the city and living the dream. After some time, I started working at Carlo’s Bakery. Fast forward again, I'm still working, but elsewhere. And then, the pandemic happened. I suddenly had some free time to think about how other people were running their businesses and their mistakes. I’ve always had a lot of opinions and thoughts about this, and I figured I might as well do something instead of just thinking more about it. Starting during the pandemic was rough and at times, unpredictable. However, we’re still here and we have a supportive team and community behind us now. Being a part of our community and working together is what motivates me every single day.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
Staying open! I’m serious about this. I feel like I’ve been very blessed to have a very very supportive staff and community. I think we’ve all seen how difficult the early days of the pandemic were for too many businesses. I’m very grateful that we managed to stay agile and adapt to different scenarios. Everyone was trying to navigate their way through uncharted territory and a constantly changing landscape. Since we opened during the pandemic, we had some idea of what we needed to do and what we needed to prepare for. It also helped that our community was very understanding of the situation and worked together with us.
What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?
I think the easy answer would be staffing. This has been an ongoing issue for not just the food industry, but also everywhere else. Luckily, we have staff that is open to learning. At some point, I figured that it would be easier to take people under my wing instead of trying to find the perfect baker. This goes back to what I said before about school and valedictorian. Even before the pandemic, kitchens, and bakeries didn’t really care that much about your grades, they cared much more about your kitchen skills, people skills, and openness to improving. For us, we were willing to teach people to fill in the kitchen skills gap. What we were more concerned about were how they interacted in a team environment and how open they were to learning.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
1. Planning. You need to understand why you are in the business and what you are trying to do. You need to come up with a plan on how you are going to accomplish your goals. This also includes the legal and financial accounting aspects. Finding an experienced tax accountant and filing your trademarks are important parts of pre-planning. You also need to understand your product and the process to make it. Having you and your staff fully understand it will allow you to streamline the process without introducing unreasonable risks. You should also never stop planning and analyzing scenarios though. It’s very important that you always be up to date on your business and be able to adapt to a changing landscape. 2. That leads to number.
2, which is to stay agile. It’s very important that your business is not completely rigid. Even though it’s 2022, the environment can still be unpredictable at times. Always be able to adapt and learn from mistakes. It’s fine if you’re caught with your pants down, but just be sure that you’re able to pull them back up and wear a belt so it doesn’t fall again.
3. Keep your passion alive. If your passion is what drove you into this business, you need to nurture it and help it grow. Owning a business can be very difficult and stress-inducing. Sometimes, your passion is lost along the way. But you must keep that flame alive to get you through the difficult times.
Is there anything else you'd like to share?
For all the bakers out there, never stop baking. My thoughts lingered before, but deep down; I knew that I wanted to bake. Once I came back, I never left. I can’t guarantee you that it will be easy. In fact, it will probably be very difficult. But if you are willing to put in the hours and work not just harder, but smarter, I can assure you that the results will show.
Where can people find you and your business?
https://www.instagram.com/boba.works/
https://www.facebook.com/bobaworks
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solopreneur that you'd like to share, then email community@subkit.com; we'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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