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Savoring the Season at the Sweet Boutique

By Scott Baker
 

         Just over a year ago, Bay City entrepreneur Rob Bash was getting ready for the sweet success of the holiday season, unbeknownst of what a year in the life of a new business may have in store for him.

This season, the 34 year old is prepared to continue into his second year with The Sweet Boutique, adding even more special touches to his chocolate and candy clientele, with the hope of ensuring another successful year. The shop is located at 719 Washington Ave. at the corner of Center Ave., on the first floor of the Phoenix Building.

"We've been open just over a year now," said Bash during an interview last week. "We opened during the Tall Ships last year, just towards the end of August. (This is) The first time as my own boss."

 Inspired by his father's fondness of unique chocolate, Bash and his wife Julie put together a local business idea with no real blueprint to follow.

"Like a lot of things, it started small and built," said Bash. "The initial thing, if I were to name one occurrence that kicked things off, was when my Dad bought a box of candy bars from a TV show that he saw on The Food Network. He took them around and showed them to people and everyone got the biggest kick out of them because they never saw them before. This company was big in their area, but they don't distribute nationally. It's not a Hershey's or that kind of thing. It's kind of a specialty thing. Because it was so unique, everyone got a kick out of it. So we just kind of snowballed from there. We figured there are other companies out there that have their own specialties that people would enjoy as much. From there, one thing led to another and here we are."

"We started with some assumptions and never having been in this business, I never had a formula to follow, but there's some basic things that any business has to deal with. Then we put together a business plan, went though it, took some guesses (and) made some adjustments. In fact, our first business plan we had to scrap, because we found out it wasn't going to work. So we revamped the whole thing and took another approach and that's what led us to retail."

Taking baby steps into the candy world, Bash found very particular companies specializing in exquisite chocolate retail.

"We started building relationships with the vendors, " he stated.  "We go to candy expos and fancy food shows and try to get in touch with a lot of new candy makers out there. A lot of specialty companies. And I think it's a big thing. Always bring in new product and try it out with our customers. The ones that want to sell the best are the ones that we keep. We're always looking for the next new thing."

While developing his own set of rules for the new business, Bash found that the customer had the final say in what The Sweet Boutique would carry.

"It's a matter of listening to the customer. They're making the rules, because they're the ones that ultimately decide if we make it or not. It's up to us to try to stay in tune with what people are after and what's pushing their buttons and trying to match the product and the service to their expectations."

"Our customers are mainly Tri-city area. Being in Downtown Bay City more and more people are coming to Bay City as a destination, so we have out of town customers that are coming to Bay City to shop not only us, but all the other shops in the area. And we're branching out. We're doing a lot more weddings and we're doing some weddings out of town. We are doing a lot of corporate gifts out of town. So the word is getting out. Our website is up and we hope to further build the outside sales through the web and mail order."

While Bash didn't have to bull through any major pitfalls, the first year was enough of a wonderland in itself.

"I think the biggest thing is getting through your first year of being open," he said. "It's the toughest year for any business. A lot of people were kind of skeptical when we opened, thinking that Bay City wouldn't support this kind of store, because it's items that you're not used to, it's not the stuff that you find at the grocery store, or the local candy shop. They're all different and some of them are a little bit more expensive than the things you find around here. On the other hand you're paying for quality and there's a lot of doubt there, but I think that we're proving that people do have a desire for something different and something a little bit nicer and they're coming here."

"There are definitely highs and lows throughout the year. I wouldn't say it's just a constant ramping up. We've got some major candy holidays and there are always spikes in the business during those times. But we're definitely building our customer base. We're always seeing new faces coming in which is nice and a lot of it is because they heard about us from current customers and they come and check us out. So I would say that we're definitely moving in that direction. There are more customers all the time."

Bash has made sure each holiday is decked out with specialties for everyone with a sweet tooth.
"Last year at Halloween we carried some bug stuff," laughed Bash.  "What I mean is candy bugs. Chocolate covered crickets, chocolate covered worms and they were pretty neat. The company we got them from, they had them packaged up in little bags or boxes and people got a big kick out of 'em. But we wanted to take it a step further (this year). As cool as it was, a lot of times people would look at it and if the package didn't say chocolate covered ant or chocolate covered cricket, you really didn't know what it was because it was just like a lump of chocolate."

"When we were at one of our shows over the summer, we got hooked up with a company that raise insects and processed them for human consumption. I don't know what the right word is--bug farmers I guess? So we were able to get our hands on the raw product, so-to-speak. Ready to eat. They're not live, they're not filled with juicy guts or anything like that, and they're kind of a crispy, ready-to-go bug. We got crickets, we got beetle larvae, and we got real scorpions. And we dressed them up with chocolate and made little chocolate discs - we call them 'Worms & Puss' - a combination of white chocolate and milk chocolate and they were irresistibly disgusting. It was a huge, huge hit for us. "

"We wanted to make sure that people knew what they were (this Halloween). So when we dipped the crickets we left the head out so people could see it. It's kind of looking at them while they eat it. The worms, a lot of times we just stuck them in chocolate so it looked like they were coming out of it or swimming in it. And the scorpions we put on a little chocolate disc and instead of really dipping the scorpion in chocolate, we kind of presented it on chocolate so you could get the full effect of what you're eating. It was gross, but we couldn't make 'em fast enough."

Thanksgiving opened the door to some fall-like flavors.
"We had some pumpkin truffles, in fact we still do through the holidays, and different flavors kind of corresponding with fall. We had a pumpkin spice and we had a spiced orange liquor truffle and some things like that. But mostly what people bought for Thanksgiving were a lot of 'table favors' - where they'd sit on the table or on a plate for each place setting at the table with a lot of truffles, a lot of chocolates, small little packages."

With Bash's busiest holiday season upon him, he was getting orders before Thanksgiving.
"Probably Christmas (is the busiest). Easter would be right behind it. Easter's a big chocolate holiday. The Christmas season starts early every year and this year people were shopping for Christmas before Thanksgiving, which is kind of crazy. A lot of the stuff that I carry, especially my finer truffles, you can't buy that early in advance. So we always get busier as the holiday goes."

"Christmas we do a lot of different things. It's not just Christmas the holiday (or) the day of Christmas. It's the season and there are a lot of parties, there are a lot of dinners. So we do a lot of hostess gift items, lots of nice little boxes and trays for the $10-15 range. We also have boxes that are Christmas themed. Really pretty boxes. A lot of them are hand made, hand painted. Of course gift baskets are a big part of the business. We do them for people, we do them for businesses, (and) we deliver and ship baskets all over the country this time of year."
Bash is already planning ahead into the New Year for The Sweet Boutique.

"We're pretty excited, January, February, March, is a big wedding planning time. People get engaged at Christmas time and New Years and it's the kickoff for the 2005 wedding season, so we're going to be increasing our exposure there. Basically after the holiday we have January to kind of catch our breath and start getting ready for Valentines and Easter."

In addition to the large main floor and showcases of chocolates and other assorted sweets, there is coffee and a place to sit down and relax, adding more to the unique Boutique experience.

"We're doing chocolate classes we call How to Be a Chocolate Snob. It's kind of a fun thing. Not real pretentious as it sounds, it's more of making fun of ourselves. What we do is learn about chocolate; where it comes from, how its made, and what the difference between a $4 chocolate bar and a .50 cent Hershey bar (is). And then we do a chocolate tasting during the class. We taste at least 12 different chocolates, varying from like a white chocolate up through different stages of milk and dark chocolates. Plus we taste different coca bean varieties grown in different parts of the world. It's really a cool class for people who don't realize all the different nuances in chocolate."

"If somebody has a group anywhere between four and ten people, they just give us a call and we fit it in their schedule or pick a date and make it work. Our full class lasts about two hours and we taste 12-15 chocolates."

For more information call (989) 895-5000 or visit their website at www.thesweetboutique.net.

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