Caroline was asked to speak at the Arts and Antiques show in Spartanburg SC in Feburary. Check out the speech that she prepared for the group who attended the show!!
I would like to thank the Spartanburg Art Museum Committee for inviting me here today. It is a delight to be in Spartanburg, have the opportunity to move my business, Caroline’s Cakes, here and meet so many of you. I have already begun to understand why everyone I have met is so very happy living here…It is indeed ‘Sparkle City.’
As I prepared for this moment and took time to reflect on what has happened in this part of my life, in this life as a ‘Cake Lady’ I realized that much of the reason I am here today is because of people; their encouragement, their support, their sometimes unexpected friendship and my desire to please everyone of them.....everyone of you......
I looked back over the past 29 years and realized that on that Sunday so many years ago, when I served the first Caramel Cake in Annapolis, MD, at my youngest son’s christening, what I did not know was that I was beginning a journey like no other. A journey that would lead me to understand all that it takes to ‘Take it to the 7th Layer.’
The early years of making and selling my cakes were the years I threw so much random energy into everyday, and I must admit not a lot of thought. The response I was getting from my friends and customers, the compliments, the continuing encouragement, just fed my soul.
It sounds so simple, but I have come to believe this is what we all need, to find something to feed our soul. Well, I liked this feeling, in fact I craved this feeling, so I drove harder and harder to do all those things that would keep all of you feeding my ole soul.....and in that, I discovered my passion.....to please and to take care of others, to share with others and listen, just for that moment.........it sounds so simple, but, I have learned that discovering ones passion is the most important thing one can do on this journey of life........and on my journey, ‘Taking it to the 7th Layer!’
And this remarkable little cake, this 7-Layer Caramel Cake was the vehicle that was allowing me to live my passion every day.
Then there were the memories that were being awaken of times past by just the taste of my Caramel Cake.
As my Caramel Cake began to be shipped across the country, phone calls and emails were coming in every week thanking me for making this cake and bringing back memories of childhood, memories of family gatherings, of forgotten celebrations, and of forgotten times. I remember driving up to see my son, Richard, play in a squash tournament in New Haven, CT. We had stopped in a little sandwich shop in CT, when my cell phone rang. It was Paul, from Houston, TX. After hearing about the Caramel Cake of his childhood over and over again, his fiancee had finally gone to the Internet searching for Caramel Cake and found my Caroline’s Cakes information page. She shared it with a very surprised, Paul, who called me immediately, to exclaim that after reading about my 7-Layer Caramel Cake, he just knew that this was the cake of his youth. Upon receipt of his cake, and a moment to taste, he called to say, ‘Caroline, you do not understand, I am 67 years old, and I have not had this cake since I was 9 years old at Aunt Bessie’s in Tupelo, MS. You have brought back so many memories. I thought I would never have this taste again. I can not tell you what you have done for me!’
WOW!.....I call that ‘Taking it to the 7th Layer!’
And then there was Eleanor, from Wilmington, NC, who had purchased a Caramel Cake at one of the benefit shows I participate in. Eleanor wrote to me in an email, ‘I froze the cake for my own birthday. I could have eaten the whole cake but was gracious enough to share with my neighbors, my daughter and my husband. This cake reminded me of my grandmother’s cake, which I have not had since she passed away 10 years ago. What memories it brought! Thank you for making a typical Monday Birthday awesome with great memories!’
And from Mrs. Maney of Augusta, GA, ‘I received your Caramel Cake as a gift for my 70th birthday. I must tell you this is the very best caramel cake I’ve ever had (I hope Mother, who is in Heaven, is not listening!). Thank you for making my birthday so very special!
Those were the days when I was making the cakes in the kitchen of our first home. I would set them out on the bench on my front porch tagged with your name, and a zip-lock bag under the doormat with change for you to leave your check or payment in. If I was home, I would enjoy brief visits with friends and customers as they would come to pick up their cakes.
Then we moved to the home where we live now, in Annapolis, MD. I placed a freezer in the garage with one of my shipping tins, labelled ‘THIS IS THE BIG RED TIN,’ sitting on top of the freezer for payment. Cakes would be tagged in the freezer for pick up, and so my customers would come and go.
In 1999, I received a corporate order from US Trust Company, out of Palm Beach, FL, for 2000 Caramel Cakes to be shipped out for them that Christmas Season. Fortunately, the request came in April, giving me time to find a larger Bakery to make my Caramel Cakes. I worked diligently with this Bakery for 14 months, finally understanding why big bakeries do not make old-fashioned caramel and realizing how much I knew about caramel, from all those years of my youth, making caramel, taffy, and caramel popcorn balls with my grandmother in Charleston.
Those things we take for granted!
So I immediately put in the most beautiful commercial kitchen and office for Caroline’s Cakes in the basement level of my home, pulled the operation out of the larger bakery and began making the cakes in my own kitchen. UPS would pick the cakes up at the garage or just come into the house and down to the “corporate headquarters” of Caroline’s Cakes to get the late shipments coming in.
Looking back on those unbelievable days. I was figuring out how best to package the cakes. How to find the appropriate coolers. What kind of coolant I was to use. How to maintain a customer contact list. How to find the right ingredients in larger quantities. Driving all over the universe to pick everything up. Coming back from the tin manufacturer with boxes of tins in the back of the car, in the front seat and tied to the top of the car........I must have been a sight..........and then I had those magnetic signs made for the sides of my car.........so everyone knew who I was.........there goes that ‘Cake Lady.’.........
I would be tearing down the road and the passengers in the car next to me would call the telephone number on my magnetic signs, get the answering machine at the “corporate headquarters” of Caroline’s Cakes, which would give you my cell number, call me as we were riding neck and neck up or down the interstate, waving back and forth at each other.....and they would start giving me an order. Not the safest way to take an order, nor is it something I am necessarily proud of, but it was part of the journey........and I really did not even know I was on it!
The Holiday Season of 2002 was a real turning point for me in this business of Caroline’s Cakes. For the first time I began to have my packaging and some of my ingredients delivered to my gargage........my warehouse. I will never forget when the first delivery of tins arrived. I had given the driver directions to our home and walked out to greet him as he began to back..... an 18 wheeler down my driveway.......OMG......What!.....Oh, My! Then came the 18 wheeler full of flour, sugar and baking supplies. Then two sometime three UPS trucks a day. At my home!
In my neighborhood! Whew! Frantic, but calm, calls to the neighbors were made, apologizing for this intrusion into our neighborhood, and letting them know I had found a place to move the business in the coming year. Fortunately, all of my neighbors thought it was sort of funny, and entertained me with many of their observations of my comings and goings in the past year as the word of Caroline’s Cakes slowly spread across the country.
In that first “corporate headquarters” of Caroline’s Cakes, and during the last Christmas Season in that location, Randall of the Food Network discovered my Caramel Cake. His grandmother had passed away that year and he was facing the first Holiday Season without her and without her Caramel Cake. He realized that he had really never seen Caramel Cakes for sale and began searching on the Internet, where he found my little information page. We had the most delightful conversation, about his grandmother, his memories and his delight in finding my Caramel Cake. It was not until the end of that conversation that I learned he was with the Food Network. We made plans to stay in touch.
The Food Network filmed Caroline’s Cakes for the very last Food Finds segment, Southern Country Classics. It aired for the first time on January 18, 2005, and was shown a total of 7 times over the next several years.
On November 3, 2003, Caroline’s Cakes moved into their new “corporate headquarters” in an abandoned shopping center out near the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. I had begun to participate in more benefit shows on the East Coast, pulling my Wells Cargo trailer with my chest freezers full of Caramel Cakes. We were all over NC, VA, MD as far north as NY and as far West as Chicago and Milwaukee. Setting up my booth, putting out my samplings of my cakes, meeting my customers, being discovered by others, and selling my cakes out of the freezers. Plus, giving back a percentage of our sales to the different causes, What a Win-Win! 2003 was the first year we really exploded!
I remember having so many shipments going out that Holiday Season that we had to wipe the front retail counter clean and use it as a second shipping station. The end of January I received this email. It sort of tells the tale of that first season in our new “corporate headquarters:”
Dear Caroline,
We were given for Christmas your Caramel Cake. I have tried many of these from all around and yours was far and away the finest thing of its kind I have ever eaten (and I have over 50 years of practice). Tonight my wife came home from a meeting and retrieved another item of yours from the garage refrigerator, a big block of “Extra Sharp Vermont Cheddar.” Try as she might, hungry as she was, she was unable to cut into it. After three knives were tested, closer inspection was required. Plain plastic wrap, check. Plain paper label, check, simple wax coating, check. Scrape away the wax and what have we here? A block of Extra Hard Vermont Pine!! On the bottom a simple little label, heretofore unnoticed reads: “Wooden Dummy #1 Classic.” We hesitate to ask my cousin if this is what he intended, his sense of humor not quite as ours. He is of the formal variety, quite proper. But I wouldn’t like to think this went by at your shop if not under management’s control.
Horrified, I called Bill, sent him a 2# block of our Vermont Cheddar, and thanked God for his sense of humor.
You see, our 1# dummy weighs the same as our 1# cheese, so one of our part-timers inadvertenly packed the sample dummy, which sat on the front counter as advertisement.
As the years passed in our new location, I began to learn all those things that are important in running a business, but have nothing to do with a cake. How to be a boss and not everyone’s friend was my most difficult hurdle. Where I had found my passion in pleasing others and having them touch my life I had also begun to experience the difficulty of what it meant to find the right people to sit in the right seats on my bus. Then learning to set expectations for those who worked for Caroline’s Cakes, encourage my team as I learned how to tightened up a growing company and turn-key every aspect in it.
And then there was harnessing my energy and harnessing my creative ideas.
Getting out on the road, meeting so many wonderful people across our great country, putting the faces to customers I had talked to for years continues to feed my soul and carry me on this ride that I was to realize was, in fact, my journey to the 7th Layer.
We now have an assortment of signature cakes that we sell all year long and are developing seasonal cakes that we sell only at certain times of the year. Our deli, which is another evolution, without an initial plan, has begun shipping many of our savory items as our customers have requested that we ship those items to their family and friends.
We have adorable little customers who mail in their checks for their cakes, with the dearest notes, thanking us for all we have done for them and for the nice conversation they had with one of my girls when they called.
And we have customers so many of you have heard of. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is a long time customer. She recently sent
a Caramel Cake to Narcisco Rodriguez thanking him for the dress he designed for her for The Globe Awards.
Bunny Williams and John Rosselli have been customers of for years. Bunny so nicely spotlighted us in her BeeLine newsletter in the last two years. She and John also opened us up to a very special Hollywood group: Tita Cahn, the wife of the late Sammy Cahn, Angie Dickinson, Jackie Collins, The Poitiers, Dick Van Dyke, Jack Nicholson.........
Steven Colbert, Oscar de la Renta, the late Bob Hope Chris O’Donnel, John C McKinnley, Barbara Streisand, Carolyne Roehm...............It has been served on Air Force One...thanks to Doro Bush. And Lou Holtz of the Gamecocks.
One of my favorite customers of note, with whom I have spoken countless times on the phone is Marvin Hamlisch.
Last summer I travelled to Jackson, WY to participate in a benefit show for their Conservation Alliance. The very first customer in our booth, saw our sign inviting one and all to join us on our Facebook Fan Page. I shared with her that we had only been building this social media networking platform for the past 6 months and were delightfully surprised that Peter Duchin had become a fan. I have no idea why I said this! She retorted, ‘You know, another famous musician is in the valley performing tomorrow night, Marvin Hamlisch. My jaw dropped.......Marvin Hamlisch........I know Marvin Hamlisch. He has been a customer for years, he has told me when I am doing things right, what I should correct and on and on about how incredible my Caramel Cake is. We left a message at the music center that I was also in the valley and would love the opportunity to meet Marvin. With that Shelley, his assistant called back.....equally in awe that we were all getting to meet after so many ‘Caramel Cake years.’ Long story short....I purchased 3 seats on the front row in the sold out auditorium of over 600 people....my hostess, a friend and I went with a bag full of Caroline’s items, including a Caramel Cake, of course. Shelly found me at intermission and took me across the stage to the Green Room to meet Marvin. I told him I had a Caramel Cake for him and he invited the three of us back to their hotel, because his wife, Terri wanted to meet me!!!!!! Well, the second half of the show, Marvin stood up and spoke to the audience saying, ‘I make it a point never to promote a product, but I have learned that tonight the lady that makes my favorite food in the world is here, Caroline, of Caroline’s Cakes. She makes the best Caramel Cake in the World.....come up here Caroline..... (the longest walk of my life)......let me tell you how good this cake is.....we could have World Peace if we used this Caramel Cake. If we sat the Israels on one side of the table and everyone that did not like the Israels on the other side of the table and served them one slice of Caroline’s Caramel Cake.......and said to them you may not have another piece until you make World Peace, we would have World Peace!!!
That same week, Katie Couric ordered two cakes for her father’s 91st birthday and our Caramel Cake was served to a sold out book signing of Kathryn Stockett’s book, The Help, to over 500 people in Greenwood, MS. All of the producers, cast,
screenwriters and Kathryn Stockett were there. It was a week my stars certainly were aligned.
As I begin the planning stage of our build-out and meet so many new people here in Sparkle City, I am constantly asked,
Why Spartanburg? Well, about 5 years ago I received a call from one of Spartanburg’s biggest fans and supporters.
He knew of my business through a vacation visit with my Mother and his cousin. Kindly he called me to say he knew much about my business, that I was trying to expand and he felt Spartanburg would be a good fit for Caroline’s Cakes and for me. With that inspiration I began to put Spartanburg on my path home driving around on my own, sometimes catching up with old classmates and friends and just getting a feel for the area. One of my greatest concerns was shipping. So I compared the Annapolis UPS shipping map to the Spartanburg UPS shipping map, looking at the coverage for our one and two day ground shipments. That pretty much helped me make the decision, As I discovered that shipping from Spartanburg I could ship to every state East of the Mississippi and 6 states West of the Mississippi 1-2 days ground. This was a huge convenience for my customers and to our company.
As I begin the process of moving Caroline’s Cakes to Spartanburg, I am over-whelmed by the opportunities in our future. There is much work to be done, many cakes to bake, customers to take care of and so many more people to meet.
All part of my journey, ‘Taking it to the 7th Layer!’
Today as I sat at my desk in our Annapolis Bakery and watched the snow and rain through the window I thought, surely Spring is about to show us the colorful buds and flowers we have come to expect at this time of year.
Their bright reminder of new beginnings is still hiding under the
comfort of the warm earth and their delayed presence dampens our
anticipation.
