Heavenly Delight Cakes Blog

Kiosk Market Square Mall

2011-03-01T01:59:00.000-08:00

Iam so excited to announce our new kiosk at Market Square Mall in Champaign. We opened the week before Valentines Day and have been running ever since. We will now be at the Mattoon mall every weekend, and the cupcake mobile will be on campus in Charleston every week parked at Jerrys Pizza.

Licoln Square Mall

2011-01-01T15:32:00.000-08:00

We finished the market inside at the Lincoln Square Mall. Had a great 6 weeks. Good Holiday season. Thanks to everyone for supporting Heavenly Delight Cakes.

Urbana Farmers Market

2011-01-01T15:28:00.000-08:00

We have been soooooo busy with cupcakes, things are just now slowing down a bit. This is our booth we had since august at the Urbana Farmers Market had a wonderful year can't wait till next year.

Cupcakes on Wheels

2010-08-18T17:13:00.000-07:00

We have started a new adventure, My plan was to buy a consession trailor and sell our cupcakes in a neighboring town. Effingham. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a loan for the used truck.

I decided to see if the city would let me sell my cupcakes farmers market style until I raised enough money to buy the truck. The health department is allowing us to sell our cupcakes. A local business Daylight Doughnuts is letting us set up on their lot, located on the main and very busy road in Effingham.

We did our first week end last week, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I baked 350 cupcakes thinking this would last all weekend. We ended up selling 900 cupcakes. We were in shock.

My daughter is helping us launch this project while she isn't working. She ia doing a Fabulous job.

I will let you know how this week goes. We only hope to grow each week.

Champaign Bridal show

2010-08-18T17:05:00.000-07:00

We have been soooooo busy, this is a display cake for the Champaign Bridal show. We decided to honor the brides. This has a brides dress for the top and vintage brides on the side. Our room was decorated in brown gold and burgandy. It was gorgeous.

Working on cakes

2010-06-28T13:19:00.000-07:00

Here is Tana working away and Les and I carving a cake!

A Weekend around here

2010-06-28T13:10:00.000-07:00

This is a typical Thursday and Friday, cakes everywhere!!!!!

making of Tow Mater

2010-06-28T12:44:00.000-07:00

We start with a 1/2 sheet cake, cut into thirds, stack, then carve. Platform is styrofoam we cover with cake foil, glue to board, then we cut a piece of foam core, covered in foil for the body to sit on. glue that to the platform. Ice in buttercream, airbrush, fondant accents, edible image door sign. Wheels are rice krispy treats covered in fondant.

making of a ball glove

2010-06-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

This is how we make our ball glove. We start with the wilton ball glove pan, and a 8" round. We carve and stack. Ice in buttercream, airbrush. Styrofoam ball, covered in fondant, edible image logo.

more pics

2010-06-27T20:06:00.001-07:00

Here ya go

Our 3,600 square foot kitchen!

2010-06-27T20:01:00.001-07:00

More pics

where we are today

2010-06-27T19:27:00.000-07:00

Our time was running out before Oct 1st, when I would loose my license. We drove around every nite trying to find a new location. Finally we found the building we are in now. It was an old Hardware store in a small town about 11 miles from Mattoon.

We rented the space, and found a small apartment about 8 blocks from our building. Again we had to move and spend about $8,000 more. We opened October !st.

Moving was a shock to our business, our business had grown 65% in our location on the busy highway. Now we were in a very small town, 11 miles from my customers. We took a big hit, things got very scary, by December we were about close the doors. I asked my husband if we could hang on until the bridal shows in January and give me a chance.

I decided to add hand dipped ice cream to draw in customers, I found a used freezer on ebay that we got for $1, seriously. No one bid on it. It works perfectly, hold 16 flavors. I found ice cream from a company in Wisconsin called The Chocolate Shoppe Ice Cream, It is the best ice cream I have ever tasted. Our customers love it too!

The ice cream has worked, it has drawn customers in, the bridal shows were successful, and we doing great with our wedding bookings.

One big plus was trying to draw customers from a town 11 miles south of us. Its a town of money and alot people. We have just broken thru that, and are getting alot of customers!!!!

On the down side we own the building in Mattoon, we have it for sale but this is not the time to sell. We have been able to rent the apartment upstairs but the downstairs remains empty. This had been a very big burden on us finacially but we are finally seeing daylight.

Our new shop

Our next step

2010-06-27T17:36:00.000-07:00

We were at Aunt Sallys for about 3 months. We found this property on a main highway, Zoned residental/commercial. It was grandfathered in. The house had an apartment upstairs. The health department gave me a year to convert the kitchen to a commercial kitchen. We invested $18,000 to make the kitchen work until we got our grant from the TIF District we were in. I had filed a petition for the TIF grant from the city to help with the other upgrades.

Our Grant was accepted by the commisioner. The health department gave us our final upgrade proposal, $35,000. When it came time to start the renovations, our city comminisioner was fired or let go or resigned what ever you choose, and our grant was denied and we couldn't get financing anywhere else.

The health department was going to take my permit away Oct 1,2009. We begain searching for another building.

The beginings of the crazyness

2010-06-27T17:23:00.000-07:00

My business began to grow at a very rapid rate. Soon the business took over our whole house and we were living in one room upstairs. The health department started making suggestions that my business had out grown the limits of a home business and I needed to open a commercial kitchen.

I signed up for some guidence help at our local college with the Score Program. I was afraid I would make a wrong decision. I was assigned a mentor Dave.

Les and I decided to sell our home of 16 years to pursue my dream.

Our house sold in 3 weeks. We were homeless, and I had cakes booked.

My aunt Sally let us move into her house, we operated out of three rooms, the health department allowed me to operate until we found a kitchen.

From the begining till now

2010-06-27T17:14:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of my first kitchen. It was about a 10x12 room in the back of our house. My first sign. I bought out a woman who had made cakes for years. The fridge is new. I guess I spent about $4,000.

The making of a Ninja Turtle

2010-06-27T06:10:00.000-07:00

This was a fun cake to do and looked cool. I think between Tana and I we made an amazing Ninja Turtle. Turtle is made with cake as the base and rice krispy treats for detail. Iced in buttercream, fondant detail, airbrushed.

My Favorite cake of all

2010-06-27T05:47:00.000-07:00

Its been since 2006 since I made this cake, but when I think back, I realize this is where the business started taking off. This is my only competition cake I have ever done and I won the Wilton Cake contest that year. I guess this cake gave me the confidence to plunge farward, pursuing my dream for Heavenly Delight Cakes. This cake for me has always been the begining to an amazing journey.

Decatur bridal show

2010-06-27T05:23:00.000-07:00

The Decatur bridal Expo is the largest event we do for the year. We book about 60% of our weddings here. Its a very busy 2 days. Thats my daughter Andrea on the far left, Les and I always appreciate her help.

cheeesecakes

2010-06-27T05:17:00.001-07:00

Here are some pictures of our yummy cheesecakes.

more cheesecakes

2010-06-27T05:06:00.000-07:00

Here are a few more flavors we offer. Everyone says our cheesecakes are the best they have ever tasted. Better than the cheesecake factory!!!!

The Crew

2010-06-26T19:55:00.000-07:00

Here is our crew. From left to right.

Mickey, Connie, Yvonne, Tana and Lori.

Standing behind one of our most recent sculpted cakes.

Welcome

2010-06-26T19:22:00.000-07:00

This is my first post. Iam so excited to share my love of cakes, and cake decorating. I will be sharing my experiences with my cake shop. All the ups and downs!