A guide - not on how to start a business but on WHETHER to start a business

Entrepreneur - Wikipedia states " The entrepreneur is commonly seen as a business leader, innovator of new ideas, and business processes .^[1] Management skill and strong team building abilities are often perceived as essential leadership attributes^[2] for successful entrepreneurs. Robert B. Reich considers leadership, management ability, and team-building to be essential qualities of an entrepreneur. "

This is the DEFINITION of an entrepreneur . But what is the reality of one??

I get at least 4 - 8 phone calls a week asking about FLOC , how I started , whether I take baking classes , whether its a profitable business and how did I start about reaching clients. And this is what has prompted me to write this blog . 

If you've been a regular follower of my blog , you will have a vague understanding of how we started the business and reached where we reached. But what I didn't realise when I was writing the previous blogs was how I was glossing over a lot of the set backs we faced and struggles we had to go through to reach this place. So if you are planning to start your own business in baking , read ahead , evaluate and then determine whether this is the path you want to go down on . 

1. FOLLOW YOUR PASSION - The primary point you would have often heard from a lot of successful business owners would be this . They followed their passion and reached where they are. I agree. When you do the thing you love the most , you end up doing it well and thus that leads to success . BUT , this DOES NOT stand true for each and every person. Follow your passion but be sure that the passion can be made into a business. If you have a skill but no one who would appreciate it , that skill is only for you. So do it , but not as your primary money maker.
2. PASSION >> BUSINESS - This is a path you must tread carefully. We can love something but our love and appreciation for this can decrease when we have to do it over and over again. I use to love baking . It was my stress buster and something that I constantly got appreciated for. However , when I converted it into a business , I realised one thing - baking as a stress buster was fun , but when I had to make the same recipe over and over again , even when I didn't feel like doing it , it wasn't that fun anymore. I got over my funk and grew FLOC but there was a time in the middle when I seriously wasn't sure if the call I had taken to make FLOC bigger was the right one. And whether my job was killing my hobby.
3. HAVE A SUPPORT SYSTEM - When you start something , you want to make sure that you stay positive. Before you achieve even a degree of success , you will face failure , not once but over and over again. There will be bad days and horrible days and hopefully a few good days. The one thing that would help in this would be having someone who supports you - a friend , a partner or a family member. And mostly the support doesn't just have to be emotional , it also has to be physical. I realised this when all those times I just didn't feel like looking at another egg , I had my sister to pick up the slack for me . She did the baking when I didn't want to and I picked up the slack when she didn't want to.
4. IDENTIFY YOUR PASSION - Many a times we end up working in the wrong area even when it is something else we want to do. A prime example is the difference between bakers and cake decorators. These are inter-dependent fields but you have to be sure of what it is that you actually love doing. Is it making cakes pretty? Or do you love baking in its purest form ? I know a lot of bakers who confuse this . I know I did . So identify it and follow what you love. Not what you feel you might love. 
5. DON'T FOLLOW THE MONEY - When we start a business , we immediately look at whether we are making profits or not. And initially , we might even be making them but if you continue to follow the money , you will loose focus. You will stop loving what you are doing and instead love money. DON'T JUST LOVE MONEY. Don't compromise your ideals. Don't lower your standards. Remember when you charge a client , you are not only charging for your material but also for your own labour so don't sell yourself short. Be prepared to face constant criticism as well as advice because its easy to praise something you are not paying for , but when people start paying for something , they expect the best. 
6. RESPECT YOUR COMPETITION - They haven't just reached where they've reached. They've put in hard work , labour and love into their business. In trying to get ahead , don't undermine them and their business. Stand by your policies but don't judge and criticize theirs. Don't undercut their prices and don't be unethical in your dealings with them because remember what you sow is what you reap. There will be someone new soon who will replace you so treat them the way you would like to be treated. 

Please feel free to add any points or discuss the points I've put down.  

These are my primary 6 points. Start a business for the right reasons and do the business in the right manner and money and success will follow.  LOVE what you do. There have been times when all I want to do is not answer the phone , take a long long vacation without being in constant touch with anyone but that stops being an option when you start a business. There is no turning off. You can take a day off maximum but sometimes even that is too much. So be prepared to jump for the long haul and before you do anything , read a book that I would recommend for any enterprising entrepreneur - " The 100$ start-up" 

My Journey through the Cupcake World

Is United States the pioneer in bringing about the Cupcake craze?
I would like to think so. Cupcakes started here long, long back and the fad soon turned into something more permanent. From what I hear cupcakes have now been around, in their current form, for at least 8 years. This is why I started the journey to discover what works and what doesn't.

We've been making cupcakes as part of our business since the very beginning, but what we were doing was what was instinctive to us - taking a part of a cake, shaping it differently and then icing it. But the question I always wondered about was whether this was the right way? Weren't cupcakes supposed to be more moist, iced differently with a yummy filling inside?? Well, I did finally discover the answer after visiting at least 20 different famous cup-cakeries around the States.

The answer - we were pretty much doing it right all along. Our top two cupcakes - the Red Velvet and the Chocolate Fudge were bang on. The others, hmmm, not so much.

Its been a journey, discovering everything the US has to offer. From the West Coast to the East Coast, each cupcakery had a different look, feel and attitude. Some were local and others global, but they all had the same underlying theme - presentation was as important as the taste and if we are to sell cupcakes, they not only have to taste delicious, they have to look amazing too. Each place had their unique style of icing and their signature flavour. They all had different looks, but all of them were super appealing to the customer. Some were easily found, while others you passed through and had to make an effort to find. But the designs that appealed to me the most were the subtle colors mixed in with a bright shade - something like could be seen at cupcakeries like Sprinkles or Magnolia. Little bakeries in many cities were good, but not great and the undiscovered ones, were undiscovered for a reason. I noticed that Americans value good talent and skill and most importantly, they promote and nurture good talent so it can grow and succeed to it's maximum ability. So if your business hasn't grown in the US there is a reason for it, and its not because you don't have the "right contacts".

Moving on to more important topics, name -- taste! While in the US, I tasted some unbelievable flavours, that you would want to go back and eat again and again and again. Some of the best stuff I had was in New York, the culinary hub but then there were also places in California that could beat even the best in New York.  There is a flavour that I can still remember and that is of the Red Velvet Cheesecake @ Magnolia Bakery in Chicago or New York. Unbelievable texture, amazing icing and something of which, not one but several bites are not enough. So much so, that my lactose intolerant cousin (my taster in this evil bake world) risked getting an allergy for this icing. That's how good this cupcake was -- it was soooo worth it! However, the BEST RED VELVET CUPCAKE I had was not here, it was in a chain known as Susies Cupcakes. It was something that we drove half an hour for, not once but twice and in a city where all I had was 3 measly hours each day for sight seeing!!!!

So if you are visiting America anytime soon and want to know the best places to go, hit us up at www.fortheloveofcake.in and check out our album "Bakeries from Around the World " on your Facebook page and you'll know all there it is to know.

Thanks!
Avani
For the Love Of Cake

Ref Link for BAKERIES FROM AROUND THE WORLD : https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.371049832943162.77099.218809414833872&type=3

Have we arrived?

I’ve been a quiet blogger recently and what is the reason for that? Well, its simple, blogging for me comes from the heart. It needs time and thought and a flow of events that would keep you guys entertained. And even though we had plenty of thoughts in our heads and events taking place, we've just been running short on time to communicate them to you. 

But as God would have it, I’ve been put on bed rest due to a strained knee (nope I'm not 70, only 26, but these things still happen). Thus, this is where I’m finding the time to write my blog. 

Lots has been happening at FLOC these days. And each day seems like a mini achievement because our aim nowadays is to do something we’ve not done before by the end of each day. To innovate, to push ourselves and to go beyond our wildest dreams and achieve those.

At FLOC, we are a team. Mostly well oiled but many a times, in need of an oiling. I’m the impulsive one, willing to believe that anything and everything is possible and plunging head on into it. My sister on the other hand, is the strong one, the one who understands the limits yet pushes beyond them and tries to achieve what I’ve imagined. I have complete faith in the fact that she can do this, even when she doesn’t. There is nothing at FLOC that we say no to (unless there would be a serious possibility of a disaster for the client). We love to change the way people see cake decoration or even cake. We love to create the impossible and what we love more, is when our clients challenge us.  And these days, clients love to challenge us. They throw one challenge after another in, and we love to accept them. After a year, we have many clients who just call us up, tell us who the cake is for and ask us to create something and this is probably what we love the most - THE FAITH.

Yesterday, we were featured in HELLO! magazine. A year and 2 months after starting, we finally got featured in a magazine. It was a mini achievement. No, not because we were featured in a magazine but because Akriti and I both had been very sure of one thing – when the time came, the media would feature us, and we wouldn’t have to pester them to do so. Till date, we have never approached the media (despite various “CONTACTS” telling us to) and even after this we would never do so. Thank You HELLO! magazine for setting a precedent.

You know you’re doing some good work, when you enter a club at night, and hear someone say “ Isn’t that the FLOC chick?" You enter a party and people unknown to you are talking about your business. When your brother sees random peoples’ facebook picture as a cake you did and your mother hears from the world how well her daughters are doing. And you truly know what achievement means, when the father who was least interested in something as mundane as baking, is overheard telling his friends at a party, “ You know today my daughters sold a cake worth Rs ***** “ in a super proud manner."

Thank you guys because everyday I feel so grateful for all the support that we are given, constantly. 

Avani for

For the Love Of Cake

91-9958614222

Rainbow Cake

A friend on our BBM stated : " If I didn't know better I would say this is art on Canvas "

How happy that makes us only we know !!
Its been a design we've been wanting to do since someone posted a Rainbow Cupcake on our wall and well one day when we saw it at the amazinng Izzy's Cakes we decided , let's do it.

Its fairly easy so if any of you out there want to do it , here's how :

Start with a plain vanilla cake recipe that you like. Now this you can do 2 ways :
1. Make all 7 cakes together which means you've to have a commercial oven and 7 molds of the same size.
2. Make each one individually and repeat the process 7 times.

Once you've decided the method here goes :
1. Colour the cakes the various rainbow colours. Remember VIBGYOR ( Violent, Indigo , Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange and Red - Embarrassing to say but we missed one !!! Can you guess which one ? )
2. Bake them one by one or all together but make sure the colours are deep enough so that they show nicely.
3. Stack them one on top of the other as given below with your choice of icing in between ( Whipped Cream or Butter Cream). The cream in between will make them stick to each other.

We missed one colour !! Guess which one??

4. Put an outside layer of icing , again the same as what you filled inside and decorate it with sprinkles.

Voila!! Cake with Sprinkles

The inside of the cake

If you are the adventurous types you can also experiment with flavours. But make sure they all compliment each other so it could be Vanilla- Lemon Alternate or Vanilla- Butterscotch. You could also have different flavours in each cake but then those would have to be eaten seperately ( And might not be that great an idea:)) 

Do let us know how it went and if you need any help , feel free to message us:)

The So Called "Silent" Partner in FLOC

Most of you know that we are more than 1 person running this company , but most of you don't know the other person as well so I thought I'll introduce her and give you an insight - She's Akriti Malhotra , the Younger Partner in the company (Do notice how I don't say Junior Partner , but younger as she's the younger sibling :) )

She's the creative , the stubborn and the perfectionist and in my words "the psycho :P" partner. She's the one whose pushy , has never had formal training but has learnt on the job and soon will be way way ahead of me. An ex finance student who quit her job at Ersnt & Young to give her GMAT and in between realised how much she loves food thus leaving all , has now decided to pursue her dream job- That of a Culinary Artist. She's a genius with food and can create something out of barely nothing. She's our "Midnight Snack Person" .

Saying that, in case you do end up calling her up for a cake , she might just give it to you for free (Bad, Bad for business). She hates talking money or business and cannot do marketing and that's why you rarely hear of her. But she IS the Upper Half of the Backbone of our Company. Her Belief - The Creative One doesn't have to market the products. Thus if you are looking for a free cake , contact her :P ( 90 percent of the times , the phone will get handed to me but in case you are lucky , haha). This Ladies and Gentleman , is AKRITI MALHOTRA

Avani Malhotra
For www.fortheloveofcake.in

6 cakes a day !!!

It seems that Saturdays are "THE DAY" to have all parties. They are our busiest days. From simple cakes to cupcakes to full on designer cakes , we've done each and everything in the span of this one day

Now 6 cakes might not seem much to you, but when each is cake takes a minimum of 3-4 hours (Excluding baking and icing time) , it is a hell of a lot of work .

 We start at approx 12 in the afternoon ( we are super lazy humans , but yeah working till 5 the previous night does also kinda add to the late waking up :P) and work for 10 hours straight. I'm sure you've started calculating 3 hours * 6 which is 18 hours but they are saying 10. Lol , Rome wasn't built in just one day ( That is if this even correct to use here ? *Blush* ) Anyhow, just like that, designer/customised cakes aren't made in one day. The process starts at least 2 days before.

We start by baking the cakes and freezing them . ( Yup all those people who tell you they bake and create on the same day , ALL THE TIME , are either super efficient or not telling you some vital details). When you sculpt a cake, it needs to be slightly hard and if done otherwise will start falling in pieces.  So yeah a day earlier we ice the cakes and cover them with icing ( depending on the client requirement).  Now it sounds honky-dorky but its a lot of work. You have to colour the icing according to what the client needs and then individually roll it out and then put the icing on top of each cake. The process itself takes at least 45 mins - 1 hour.

On the day itself is when we start working on all the details , the small , tiny elements that are soo important on a cake. Each element is researched on ( Google is our God) and made using various tools. It takes time but we know how important those are. Finally, the time comes to integrate the elements with the cake . That done, the cake is given a final touch- up and boxed to be picked up by the client.

Now imagine all this * 6 in one day. ( The 6 pictures above done in various colours is proof of what we are saying) That is what our Saturdays are all about. Its been hell for our social lives but oh what a pleasure for us :)

Thank You

Avani Malhotra
For www.fortheloveofcake.in

Confessions of a Chocoholic??

I'M A CHOCOHOLIC. I love , love the taste of chocolate and can devour more than 4 any given day. This doesn't bode well for my weight but arghh, that's another story for another day.

In this entry , I don't promise to tell you all that there is to chocolate or what exactly is chocolate. I'm not a chocolate maker and only make them for fun and to place on top of my cakes. But that's it !! If you are looking for a crash course on chocolate, google it but if you are in India and looking to make chocolate for fun, read ahead!!

Chocolate - that super yummy, change the taste of your mouth aphrodisiac. Its a mood uplifter and can be an addiction. Ask anyone around me , they'll tell you about my "Chocoholism". If you are like me, you must try your hand at making some.

The Heel, the Boot and the Lipstick are all made out of chocolate.

Amateur Crash Course 1 : TYPES OF CHOCOLATE : From what I've learnt there are two main types of chocolate - Compound and Couverture.

• Couverture is the superior chocolate which we rarely ever get in India and is expensive as hell. 
• Compound, its cheaper version is quite good and is what you find in most home-made chocolates so our discussion from here on will always refer to Compound Chocolate. 

Amateur Crash Course 2 : Types of Compound Chocolate (Given in order of increasing Cocoa Butter content) :

• Dark Chocolate : Its not the pure dark chocolate but good enough
• Semi-sweet Chocolate : It's what most home-made chocolates are made of and is mostly dark but with a slight sweetness to it. 
• Milk Chocolate : Its MILKY. I never ever use it while making home-made chocolate as how many ever brands I've tried, it always leaves a slight after-taste in my mouth which I do not like. 
• White Chocolate : Do I need to describe this ? However one thing I will say , its the fastest melting one out of all the others due to the high Cocoa Butter content. 

Amateur Crash Course 3 : Brands of chocolate found in the market :

• Selbourne - Decently superior taste wise, it is also expensive. 
• Morde - Not as great but one of the most popular
• 2 MA - Low quality and not great for making chocolates but its all right for usage in other forms of baking. 

There are many others brands that you will find there. Experiment and use the one you feel is the best. Don't just go by word of mouth. 

Amateur Crash Course 4 : Making Chocolate (Simple and easy):

• Buy yourself some Chocolate Moulds ( Found at most departmental stores or specialty baking stores , you can purchase some from the suppliers listed on my other post, Pigmento there specially keeps the cheap ones which are for amateur bakers,  http://floc-fortheloveofcake.blogspot.com/2012/01/sharing-and-caring.html ) 
• IN THE KITCHEN :

1. Keep your moulds ready . 
2. Melt your chocolate - There are two ways of doing this .

• In a double boiler - Break your chocolate compound , make a double boiler, put the chocolate in the double boiler and melt it while constantly stirring so that there are no lumps. Once melted take off heat. 
• In the Microwave - Now though told by most Chocolate Makers, this is not a very good way , I've found it very useful for small amounts of chocolate. Again break the compound into small pieces, put in a microwave safe bowl, which does not mean glass bowls ( Remember if the bowl is to hot for you to touch after a minute in the microwave , its too hot for the chocolate too) and heat it at 30 second intervals while stirring the chocolate inside after each 30 seconds for about 5-10 seconds.  Once the chocolate is mostly melted, take it out and stir it till fully melted ( The heat in the already melted chocolate will melt the rest ).

      3. MOLDING THE CHOCOLATE : Now put the melted chocolate into the moulds with a spoon so that   

          you don't over fill and once done with all the cavities, tap the mould lightly by raising it and dropping it 

          on your work surface. Do not leave it , drop it while holding it so that it levels out and no chocolate is 

          outside the cavities. 

    

     4.  COOLING THE CHOCOLATE : Put it in the fridge (not freezer) and after 10 mins take it out and 

         de-mould it by inverting the chocolate mould and lightly tapping on the top of each chocolate. They 

         should fall out easily. If not , do not force them . Put them back in the freezer for 5 mins and take them

         out again. 

These are your Basic Chocolates. If you've any questions , message on this and I will reply back. 

Enjoy !!

Avani Malhotra

for www.fortheloveofcake.in