Madam Bakster
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Madam Bakster
Online bakery- and recipe platform
public limited liability company
Belgium
Guiltfree desserts are unique.
Laura Verhulst, founder of Madam Bakster
Yoshi Janssens
Laura Verhulst
Summary
Madam Bakster is an online bakery- and recipe platform with a focus on healthy desserts. The desserts Madam Bakster makes are totally free of animal products, wheat and refined sugars. More so, Laura doesn’t use preservatives and all her recipes and desserts contain solely purely natural products. Madam Bakster strives for the authentic taste, without the less healthy ingredients.
Background
From when Laura was little she had a healthy obsession with food and desserts in particularly. If she wasn’t studying or reading, you could find her in the kitchen baking something. Friends and family gave her a nickname: Madam Bakster. (Bakster, 2016)
When Laura was 15 years old, she lost 25 kilograms. This changed her relationship with food and nutrition entirely. However, she always enjoyed food, she didn’t succeed to do so after her diet. She counted every calorie, felt guilty after each restaurant visit and worried too much about the little number on the scales. Nutrition and sports became an obsession. Also her social life suffered strongly because of this. A couple of years ago she decided to try another approach and to switch to a healthy lifestyle without a restriction of calories but with a limited consumption of animal products, wheat and refined sugars. Steadily, she worked on a heathier relationship with nutrition.
The idea to share her experiences and inspire others to build a healthy relationship with food slowly rose to the surface. She says “A lot of people ban desserts when they want to live a healthier lifestyle. Though, they are part of our social life. A diet isn’t meant as a punishment, but as a lifestyle. Madam Bakster wants to show that people can still enjoy desserts by proving that they a healthy lifestyle and desserts can go hand in hand. (Bakster, 2016)
Madam Bakster is an example for healthy and conscious choices, feel good but especially be together. After all, you never eat a dessert alone. Laura thinks it’s very important to inspire others to enjoy desserts yet again and show them their social function. She hopes to strengthen the bond between consumers and pure, honest and artisanal food. (Bakster, 2016)
Madam Bakster launched in November 2015. Laura started with a small capital injection of €3500, but primarily bootstrapping was used.
Mission
Prove that desserts can fit in a healthy lifestyle.
Vision
Prove that desserts can fit in a healthy lifestyle.
Values
Healthy nutrition, conscious consumption, attach importance to artisanal products and the revival of the social role of desserts.
Business Model
Madam Bakster started from scratch concerning her business model. She had an idea and started working out the pillars of the business model canvas.
Madam Bakster offers guiltfree desserts to its customers (cookies, cakes, muffins, brownies, scones etc.) via her webshop and 5 selling points. Social media responded very fast to this innovative bakery. In order to attain more brand awareness Madam Bakster works together with the food services industry and places recipes on her website. What makes Madam Bakster innovative is the philosophy behind the product. They have a strong focus on customer service and contact with people. Madam Bakster tries to bond with each customer. In the future, Madam Bakster wants to make the customer experience central through the packaging. The revenue stream exists of selling cooking books, products and the philosophy behind Madam Bakster.
Madam Bakster gets a revenue by selling products to the B2C market. On the long term she also wants to get active in the B2B market, but now she focuses on one of the two markets due to a lack of resources. Other revenues in the future are lectures, cooking books and workshops.
Madam Bakster started and figured out things herself. Only after a month it was pointed out to her that a lot of authorities existed which could help her with her business. She says that the community of student-entrepreneurs was vital. Expertise was being shared and discussions and salons on a specific topic were held. Startit@KBC was a kind of mentor for Laura and also Durf Ondernemen were the main authority for student-entrepreneurs. Laura also learned a lot in the entrepreneurial optional subjects at university.
On a very short note Laura learned some things her own about marketing. In the very beginning she was present on some local markets, after a while she started with selling points. She launched in November which was Christmas time, the ideal time to do some marketing. A couple of weeks later she participated a TV program. From the beginning she strongly focused on brand awareness.
Growth
In about 6 months Madam Bakster quadrupled in size. She starts with one selling point selling one cake a week, now she serves multiple cakes a day. In the beginning there were 10 – 20 customers, now there are 80 B2C customers. Orders vary in size of course.
Customers
Madam Bakster’s main customers are women between 25 – 45 years old, often young moms. A second group are people with allergies. In general people who want a healthier lifestyle for them or their family come to Madam Bakster.
Competitors
Madam Bakster has no direct competitors. There exist some sugarfree bakeries or vegan bakeries in Belgium, but this is indirect competition because Madam Bakster targets a very broad audience and serves a big variety of products. Raw Food Chef Julie is also very known, but this is another price range. In short, all existing competitors are indirect competition for Madam Bakster.
Conclusion
Opportunities for Madam Bakster are the big growth potential, follow the healthy food philosophy, the requests from other cities in Belgium and from outside of Belgium. Treats are upcoming competition. Also retail isn’t the easiest sector. As a weakness Laura states that Madam Bakster is dependent on daily sales and that the sector has small profit margins.
Important things Laura learned is that you have to work in a lean manner in the start-up phase. The principle of ‘get out of the building’ to raise brand awareness and to receive feedback is very important. She also says the look and the feel have to be there from the beginning onwards. If you want to grow, you have to know that everything depends on the brand awareness.
Some tips she wants to share with other starters are that you have to follow your passion. Doing business equals working long days/nights and if it isn’t entirely what you want you will quit. Another tip she gives is that you have to think forward, be rational. And failing is an experience. Doing business is a learning process.
The biggest obstacle for Laura as a student-entrepreneur was the credibility. This sometimes was an issue when approaching potential partners. As a starting company her obstacles were that you have to think about a lot of things and that she was financially limited. She has to go to work creatively.
In 5 years, she wants to make as much people as possible aware about her vision and try to start a movement.
Posted on 13/05/2016