You're getting to know our founders a little more everyday. The context provider. The cut-to-the-chase-er. The outside observer. While the businesses we've begun are in different industries, the hustle is similar - living the literal dream while trying to make ends meet, and having the right tools for the job.
Were we getting ready for a dog show? Nope. A theater performance? Nope. A farmers market? YES! This week, you'll learn about Bottoms Up Bagels' (BUB's) first sales day - which was not unlike the build up and culmination of a Christopher Guest movie. Whether you are an over-complicator, over-achiever or just thrive on the "figuring it out" of entrepreneurship, this episode is for you.
But first, here are the other tasty, crispy bits on the edge of this podcast lasagne:
And does polyamory apply to prep kitchen usage? I mean...
CW: Adult language and themes; pro-caper sentiment
Links:
Maryland Cottage Food Business Resources
Theme music by Thorn Haze
Additional music by Pumpupthemind (via Pixabay)
Artwork by Lisa Orye
Find more at proofingstage.com
Follow us on Instagram and Threads @proofingstage
See Buzzsprout's Privacy Policy for listener privacy and read our disclaimer here.
You're getting to know our founders a little more everyday. The context provider. The cut-to-the-chase-er. The outside observer. While the businesses we've begun are in different industries, the hustle is similar - living the literal dream while trying to make ends meet, and having the right tools for the job.
Were we getting ready for a dog show? Nope. A theater performance? Nope. A farmers market? YES! This week, you'll learn about Bottoms Up Bagels' (BUB's) first sales day - which was not unlike the build up and culmination of a Christopher Guest movie. Whether you are an over-complicator, over-achiever or just thrive on the "figuring it out" of entrepreneurship, this episode is for you.
But first, here are the other tasty, crispy bits on the edge of this podcast lasagne:
And does polyamory apply to prep kitchen usage? I mean...
CW: Adult language and themes; pro-caper sentiment
Links:
Maryland Cottage Food Business Resources
Theme music by Thorn Haze
Additional music by Pumpupthemind (via Pixabay)
Artwork by Lisa Orye
Find more at proofingstage.com
Follow us on Instagram and Threads @proofingstage
See Buzzsprout's Privacy Policy for listener privacy and read our disclaimer here.
Proofing Stage Episode 2 Transcript
Michelle: [00:00:00] I'm Michelle Bond with Joan Kanner and Amanda Schwarz. This is the Proofing Stage Podcast.
Amanda: Writing abbreviated disclaimers is fun, right? So I asked ChatGPT to do it for me. Here we go.
[from ChatGPT, read by Amanda] Before we dive into today's episode, we want to make it clear that the opinions expressed on this podcast are our own. While we strive to provide accurate and well-researched information, the views and thoughts shared here are personal, and may not reflect the opinions of any organizations or individuals we may be associated with. Our goal is to create a space for open and honest discussions, and we encourage you, our listeners, to form your own opinions based on a variety of sources. Remember, everyone is entitled to their own perspective, and we appreciate the diverse viewpoints that contribute to meaningful conversations [end ChatGPT-generated text here]
Not bad, ChatGPT. But I'll add that if you'd like to review our full notice and disclaimer, which we did not trust to technology, you'll find it on our website, ProofingStage.com Now that we have that out of the way,
Welcome to Proofing Stage, a podcast about business on the rise, where we examine the space between "atta girl" and "I told you so."
I'm Amanda Schwarz, soon to be joined by Michelle Bond and Joan Kanner. We are glad you're with us.
Bootstrapping. You'll hear us talking about it a lot. When you're getting started and money is an issue, you've got to do what you can with what you've got. Hell, I do all the work I do because I could afford a computer and that was all I needed.
Podcasting wouldn't even be a possibility if I didn't have access to relatively affordable platforms, both for recording and production. But eventually you have to move off the affordable and into a higher quality platform, which I did between the last episode and this one.
I've been working out of my house for the entirety of Mended Digital. It's where I've done all of my recordings until recently, when I had to deal with a new and strange to me, auditory obstacle - landscapers. I live in the Ohio suburbs, which is a long story in itself. Landscaping goes hand in hand with the reality of HOAs and the overall culture of suburbia. The lawnmowers and leaf blowers arrive and are powered up without warning, which makes scheduling recordings unpredictable. To attempt to gain more control, I tried out two different local co-working spaces, both touting podcast booths. The first one was not soundproof. The mic picked up every conversation behind the walls and doors. You won't be hearing that recording. What you will hear today is my first recording on the new platform, coupled with a different podcasting booth that featured a heating duct placed directly over my head. These are the growing pains, friends.
Well, what I'm getting at is, I sit at my kitchen table hoping that the roofers don't start until later this afternoon, is that the content is worthwhile. The sound is not great. And we thank you in advance for sticking with it, and please know it is going to get better from here. And until I can afford to build a soundproof booth in my basement or rent out a $400 an hour studio 35 minutes away, I'll be bootstrapping.
Before we begin, I want to mention that this episode contains explicit language as well as a touch of adult content.
In our last episode, I talked to Joan and Michelle about how Bottoms Up Bagels rose out of their Baltimore Diners Survey, and lessons that they learned through Karmic Messenger and the development of their Fugue app. The goal was to create something people needed, but bagels? For some reason, these two are making bagels in their house?
Michelle: Well, for some reason, I mean, because we hadn't had bagels in like 10 years. So we got tired of waiting.
Amanda: Um, so was this, was this something that you had just kind of ruminated between the two of you? Like, my God, we, you know, this has just been terrible. We have to fix this. Um, were there other, were there other foods that you guys were trying to fix at the same time? I mean, or was it just - it’s the bagel. We've had enough. We need bagels.
Michelle: So we were foodies. We're definitely home cooks, passionate about um, trying different recipes, doing different things. Um, at the time we had, you know, other careers at that point, but we were on a traditional Monday through Friday schedule. So we would do a lot of, you know, our weekends were filled with, making different things and eventually on a scale of, you know, catering our friend's baby shower or, you know, just with a range of recipes, but the bagels were something that were Joan's idea, of course, that we do for ourselves one year for Christmas when we were staying [00:05:00] in town. And so, we hadn't had quote unquote good bagels at that point in forever, and we'd just made a little sampling of bagels and lox. A, little… what, two pound piece of lox?
Joan: Oh yeah, it was nothing.
Michelle: And, uh, just made it for ourselves to have on Christmas morning. And, I think we were just completely blown away that this familiar taste and texture and flavor just instantly came through. It was like a punch in the face. And so we were like, "huh, so it is possible to have a bagel that tastes like this." Uh, we just had given up. I mean, uh, I, I'm not a big carb person, um, as it is, but a bagel is a bagel.
And so if, if it wasn't going to be what we associated with the bagel, we just didn't have them. So this was like, it really kind of took me way back, and so, but it kind of stayed at that level for a while.
Joan: No, it did, and - sidebar - which may not make it to the recording, um, coming through, just so you know, Amanda we were robbed. Like, we had, like, a break in. We had Michelle's, um, brother and, ah, nephew-in-law? Is that a thing? They were in town to go to the Ravens game and just like, chill out. We went to the game. We left, uh, it was a one o'clock game.
Around like, eleven or so, we got notices from our alarm company. Didn't think anything of it, because sometimes the door I mean, just, it's faulty, generally, that kind of shit. And, um, yep, it was ...we happened to have, like, a break in. And it was, of course, Baltimore-tastic, in which case we were told by the cops, like, "well, you should have had a floodlight." P. S. We have a floodlight, but when it's 11:30 in the morning, there's like nothing to worry about. So there was all that, and "why didn't you have cameras," and like all that shit.
So it was a tough. It was like a hard candy Christmas for us, because it was like in December headed towards the um, winter holidays. Ta da!
Michelle: So the bagels and lox making was also like a comfort food. Like, oh, let's make this comfort food from our childhood. And, you know, it's a fun challenge, and it'll be something we can do Christmas morning, and, you know, the whole thing. And so, um, yeah.
Joan: And people also beat into you that it's the water that makes a good bagel. And I think that we were, in part, having other jobs and just seeing that, like, no one's making this shit, so we're just gonna eat other carbs. Also, to me, unless it's gonna be a good carb, I don't want it. It's not like I'm doing keto or any of that shit, but I do really, I'm mindful of, like, what kind of sugars I take in just because I feel a certain way about them.
So, when we made them, they were definitely, you know, it definitely demonstrated that you didn't need specific water from the New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Tri-State area. It's just about process and technique, but it was a very, very small batch per Michelle's earlier points. I mean, it's like any home cook who's just like, "Oh yeah, I pickled a heart." I'm just like, "you're probably feeding like yourself and two of your buddies." Like it's, it is impressive to some degree to understand, like, how hard those things are, but it's nothing like scaling something up for mass production.
Michelle: Yeah, but we also, I mean, like, like anything, you're proud of what you make, right? So we would tell friends, and they were like, "Oh, I want to do that." Or "I want to try." Or… and so then we had two dear friends of ours over for, um, one of their birthdays and we did it as an activity. So we made them [bagels] again and then we were like sitting around eating them and they knew, you know, we all had kind of, you know, like many people do, you have kind of these entrepreneurial fantasies, or you talk about: "we should do this" or "we should do that." Or, you know, so, and we had already been, had this long time diner counter service restaurant breakfast concept, you know, "someday I want to have a breakfast spot" kind of idea. And so this started to dovetail with that.
And incidentally, I mean, that's the same time that little dabbling session with our friends is the same time that we came up with the name for the business because we were making bagels and we put one of them in our oven upside down. And the method that we use kind of tucks in all the pieces of dough around the center, underneath. And usually when you fire it off, that kind of seals, and you, and you don't even notice it. But, we put one of the ones in upside down, and it kind of formed a crown when it baked off. Kind of looked so…we were just joking around about how, "Oh, I guess that's what the bagel looks like when it, when its ‘bottoms up.’"
And, um, you know, just started talking about that concept of cheers, and like, what eventually became kind of like our "here's to every day" mantra and tagline because you know, it's like people toast drinks and they toast to someone's birthday or they toast to like special occasions, but what if you had a similar sentiment for your everyday, and it felt like bagels were like a good vehicle to do that with.
Amanda: So when did you know that this was going to be bigger than "we're just having a couple of friends over" and, you know, making bagels for them? When was the, the moment where you're just like "Well, crap. This is, this is obviously it."
Joan: It's an excellent question. It makes me [00:10:00] think about some of the less glorious things that prompted us to move along with the business. Michelle was working at a place that maybe didn't see her for all of her value. And you were in the transition, Michelle, in terms of your job. I was approaching year 15 in grants and contracts management and social science research, and I was at a place where, well, I had an awesome title, and where I had a really amazing office that overlooked such greenery, and I had a decent salary, for sure.
I was also working at the level of just "worker," like I, I didn't have anybody report to me; the things that I was offered as part of the position were not fulfilled. And I actually had it, and I just thought, you know what, I'm just going to make it to two years at this job, which is the shortest I have been at any job, by the way, um, and I'm just going to, I'm going to make sure I hit those 15 years in, just so I can say I worked in this for 15 years, and bounce.
I was already wanting to leave where I was.
Michelle: Yeah, I think the main thing, it was less about, these two things kind of came together at once. It's like, one, we realize that good bagels can be made at least on a small scale. And two, we were both at the end of, I think the journey of the first really long term career push that we each respectively were having.
And so we had already started to talk about what's the overlap in our skills. Like, can we, is there something that we can do on our own? Because, you know, Joan wasn't finding the environments that she wanted. I was feeling like I had a lot of experience and I was working crazy hours. And I, I mean, I was appreciated at the time, but at the end of the day, I didn't have anything.
At the end of the day, I was left with, you know, that was the same as any other job because I was on my own. And so I was consulting, trying to, you know, just bring some money in. And so I had time. So, you know, like any overachiever, you're like, "okay, well, I got time. So let's make this, let's, let's see if we can do something with this."
And that's, that's basically what happened was just during, um, the latter part of 2015, I had the time to mess with the recipes. I had the time to put together a plan of how this could work if we just started it at a, on a very small scale at a farmer's market to test the concept. I had the marketing background, you know, I threw up a Facebook page.
So it wasn't like we were off and running, but we just had the time to give it a try is really what it came down to.
Amanda: You decide that you're going to do the farmer's market concept. What does that look like from, having, you know, you've, you've worked on a bagel recipe, it works, you've got, you've got an idea, you've got a concept. What does that shift look like from you're in your house to now you are serving bagels at a farmer's market? What's that like?
Joan: I will say we had no choice in terms of selling. I guess we could have done some sort of bagel speakeasy out of our house and had randos in our house. I don't even want to be doxxed right now. So that wasn't going to fucking happen. And thanks to Maryland Cottage Law, we could sell at farmer's markets or farmer's markets. I'm all about choice. And we chose farmer's markets.
Michelle: Yeah, it's true. We, um, and we had, again, these couple of friends of ours really, who were just all for the adventure of it in terms, I mean, they had other jobs too, and they were just like… honestly, what it involved was a lot of math.
I never… I would tell any kid in grade school that you don't think math matters, but as soon as you want to have your own business, or as soon as you want to start, um, you know, anything regarding retail or baking, uh, it comes in handy. So it was just, uh, I started scaling recipes from, I think the first batch that we started with was an eight-count recipe. So we made eight bagels and then we made 16. And then, you know, so then I started, um, I think it was a 30-count batch became our standard working out of home based on tinkering in terms of, you know, I think anybody who knows baking knows you get to a point where you can't just double the recipe, right?
Like, you need to adjust because things behave differently. And so, it involved, you know, scaling to still what was uber small batches, but, um, it involved a lot of stainless steel mixing bowls of the highest, uh, of the biggest size you could buy - not at a restaurant supply store - along our living room table and a lot of mixing by hand.
[Audio of Michelle reading starts]
Event supply list. November 2015. Ingredient tab. Ingredients. Size. Quantity. Unit price. Shipping costs. Purchase location. Have. Need. Purchased. Bread flour. Baking soda. Active dry yeast. Eggs. Rye flour. Fresh Salmon, Butter, Scallions, Sriracha, Black [00:15:00] Peppercorns, Fresh Dill, Parsley, Brown raw sugar Materials and Equipment tab, Quantity, Count Size, Cost, Shipping Cost, Total, Location, Need, Purchased, Brown Paper Bags - Small, Brown Paper Bags - Medium, plastic pint containers, chalkboard paint, trash bins and bags, additional tables, bread knives, vinyl gloves, spreading knives, cutting boards, napkins, salmon knife, coolers, paper towels, aluminum pads and lids, deli wax paper.
[Audio of Michelle reading ends]
We decided that the way that we could roll this out was on Small Business Saturday, because on Small Business Saturday, uh, the local farmer's market near us had a special pop-up market, which means you didn't need a spot in the regular market. So anybody who was just starting out in a business or had maybe like what was primarily an Etsy-based business or something, if they wanted to get in front of people, this was a chance to do it.
It was a one-off and it was a pretty low barrier to entry in terms of fee. And so that became our goal. We kind of had that as on the calendar. And then that became the thing that we were going to scale for. So it involved, um, you know, rallying folks for late night, um, mixing and early morning baking and, um, getting all the pieces together.
Right. Like setting up a stand, like, are we going to have hot food and cold food? Like, how do we keep things cold? What's the, how do we advertise, you know, we weren't being, having a little bit of marketing background, I also didn't want to just say, "this is who we are. We're Bottoms Up Bagels." This is a, "let me just, like, make a quick logo and this is who we're going to be." Like, we've really approached it from that MVP, like, you know, Minimally Viable Product standpoint of, like, just testing and getting feedback and putting out who we thought we were, but seeing what people responded to in all ways and shapes and forms before we really formalize anything.
Joan: We haven't had a Joan Foreshadowing Moment. And I don't want to have that regret with you both. I feel like that's not, it's not fair to you or to our listeners.
Amanda: Go for it.
Joan: Michelle mentioned the special pop-up market outside of a farmer's market. That was our entry point to selling to the public.
What I will say is that the market was also outside of the traditional market and the vendors, and the politics within that space. And that's Joan's Foreshadowing Moment for today.
[sound effect]
Amanda: Two questions. What did you serve that day? How broad was the menu? And I want to know what was the, when you have this day and you sell these things, what is your expectation for the next time?
Michelle: Yeah, well, and it was a lot of, um, you know, so much planning goes into these things? It's, it's crazy to even think about because for that one-day event, I mean, I think we had easily two months. That was in November. I think we started planning at the end of August. And I mean, this is a product that you make fresh. So it's not like we were prepping the product. We were, it was all of the, where do we get, how can we maximize, um, how can we maximize our oven space so that we can make more at a time.
Like, what's the number of bagels we're going to try to have at this market, having never done this before, right? Like, is 300 enough? Sure, let's make 300 and see what happens. Because we're also, you know, it's a bagel concept, and so we don't want to just make sandwiches. You want people to be able to get half dozens and dozens.
At the same time, uh, you make more money off sandwiches and it's a lot of freaking work, right? So you want this balance. Um, so something like, okay, what's a standard size? You know, most people when they're working in their ovens at home have a half sheet tray, right? There's, there's a rare find of a three quarter sheet tray, which is the maximum size that can fit in most conventional ovens.
So, um, like hunting, so realizing that, like, wow, so instead of making 12 at a time, we can make 16 or 20 at a time. And like, just kind of mapping that out. So all the processes of how this is going to work. Like, how many batches we're going to make, when they're going to get made, how we're going to store them, all that kind of stuff.
Um, and then like, how many tables we're going to have. And, uh, so to answer your question, and in retrospect, and this is a, this is a theme of, um, certainly "Michelle and Joan" and thereby many times "Bottoms Up Bagels" is like, we just do things that I guess the negative way to say it would be more complicated, um, than they need to be, but the positive way to be just like, we [00:20:00] just don't ever...
Joan: It's pushin' it.
Michelle: ...start small, you know, like we should, we could have just had bagels and cream cheese and maybe lox, which would have been - considering we make it - mind blowing to begin with. And there are many successful bagel shops that that's all they sell to this day, right? Um, they have multiple locations and that's all they sell because you keep the menu small and make it easy, but we're Jersey Girls and I mean, you need a hot, you need an egg and cheese and some sort of pork product on a bagel. You need it, right?
Like, so, there's no way. That was like, not negotiable. So, the long answer to your question is, we had, um, a modest amount of bagels and schmear. So, um, we started with four kinds of bagels. We had a plain bagel, a pumpernickel bagel, an everything bagel and a black Russian Bagel. That's it.
Joan: Really? What's that?
Michelle: Black Russian. Pumpernickel Everything.
Joan: Oh, that's right…
Michelle: Right. Which is my favorite. So we had to have that. So four bagels, basically variations of one another. If you have a plain bagel, plain base bagel, and pumpernickel base bagel, then you throw some everything on top of that and everyone's happy for the most part. So four kinds of bagels. We had, um, basic, but even this, I'm thinking like we could have just had, like, plain schmear and green onion, but no, we had plain, we had green onion. We had lox, like a lox schmear. Um, and then I was like, “You know what? We're foodies. I want to be classic.” Like everything about this is like old school bagels, but I want something a little different. Like I want something that intrigues people, but is not too complicated. And so I came up with this Sesame Sriracha Cream Cheese, which is, um, to this day, like a fan fave. Um, and it's, so it's a little, it's got a little trail of heat, but it's got a nice kind of richness with a little bit of sesame oil.
And at the time, this is 2016, 2015, so sriracha is everywhere and doing everything. And so ...
Joan: It still is. Just, um, people are, I think, people are rationing it still, as of the date of the podcast...
Michelle: So you want to, like, hook, sort of like at that time, hipsters. And like trends, you know, you want to, like, attach to trends, but you don't want to stray too far from being classic.
So, so that was the schmears that we had. So you could get a bagel with a schmear on it, or you could get any of those schmears in a tub. Uh, an 8-ounce tub along with a half dozen bagels. Then we had the hots. You want to talk about the hots, Joan?
Joan: I will say, did we actually have hots on the first one [event]?
Michelle: We did. We had a Jersey Brekkie [sandwich].
Joan: How the hell did you and the person I will not name, make that happen on that day?
Michelle: We did. We had one person up front, which was on register and doing the bulk stuff. And then I think I was in the back making sandwiches.
Joan: Right. Which, even when we had scaled up, I will say that not many people make hot sandwiches, cold sandwiches and take bulk orders.
And I would just like to think that we reach higher. Because we can. Just pushing the envelope.
Michelle: Yeah. I mean, I think we really like wanted to put it out there. This is what this is, right? This isn't just, this is not just a hobby. Like we wanted to recreate a bagel shop at every stage of this business. We wanted to recreate the food and the culture that we, that were ubiquitous where we grew up in Northern Jersey. And so that's what this was, from jump. And so, you know, it changed a little bit, it expanded obviously, grew and took on different forms over the last eight years, but from that first occasion, we had all those elements.
And, um, and at the time, too, we didn't have a bacon, egg, and cheese, cause we were like, yeah, you can do bacon, egg, and cheese, but we're gonna do, of course, Taylor Ham/Pork Roll, cause we're Northern Jersey Girls. And so we had the Jersey Brekkie, which is still the name of that sandwich today, which is that pork roll, egg, and cheese. And it's just a standard egg and cheese, and then, um, the schmears, so.
Oh, and a Loxed Up, of course. So, the Loxed Up was also born, which is our house cured lox that we make. And green onion cream cheese, and capers. Which, who knew capers would also be so controversial?
Joan: We can't unpack that right now. I think that's, that has to be its own episode, honestly.
Michelle: Yeah.
Amanda: Did you have a successful first day out? I'm assuming it went okay.
Joan: I think that there were minimal oven injuries. I was at home with a pal of ours doing the, well, again, I have a face for production. Like I, I shouldn't be a front of house person, just, I mean between that and, like, how I speak to people. Do you remember that Panera used to have like that, that motto of “Breakfast with Respect”? I just see that and I laugh, and I laugh, because I'm not capable of it.
Amanda: What does that even mean - “Breakfast with Respect”?
Michelle: I know. What does it mean? That's a good question.
Joan: You know, of course there’s like "speedy breakfast" or "good value." I don't fucking know. But there were no injuries on our end. I just remember getting texts from Michelle who was on-site saying which flavors they were out of. So we were holding back on dough and that was the first experience we [00:25:00] had with doing a "Rolling Boil and Bake" in which case you hold back some dough and you boil and bake based on demand. And that was our, our first time - which makes sense - was our first time selling/doing that concept which we later brought to the Bub Hub beta and also to some Roadshow events.
Amanda: So you are, Michelle's on the ground making sandwiches and all of those things. This is the first day, and Joan, you're back at the house, getting, getting responses saying, "Oh, we need more bagels." How long does a bagel take to bake?
Joan: Good Lord, you need to make sure they get to some sort of relative to room temp situation. You need to boil them for X number of minutes, then you need to, like, pop them into an oven, which is hopefully to temp for you. And then you need to also let them cool a wee bit, which, to be honest, we really didn't. We just had the car ride from our house to the market and that was, like, five minutes and then we would tuck and roll.
My buddy would run out as I was driving the getaway car and he would drop it off with the ladies, come back into my car, then we'd ride back, come back and do a little bit of, like, zhuzhing or cleaning in our kitchen and then get ready for the next order.
Amanda: And you're doing this between, okay, farmer's market opens at around 8 o'clock?
Michelle: Uh, yeah. I think this one was a little bit later because it was this kind, of like, um, adjunct part of the regular market. So this event I think was like 9 to 2 or 9 to 3? But typically they are earlier. Yeah.
Amanda: Okay, but it's at least running to 3. It's not cut off at 12, which means this is a full day of early morning prep. You're in there. You, I mean, in the market, you've set up your booth and now after you've set up, and you're cooking and Joan's running back and forth at the end of all of this. Are you looking at each other like "That was the best day ever." Are you saying, what are you saying to each other? "This was crazy. Let's do it again?" Like what was the…
Michelle: No, it was, it was awesome. I mean, it was, it was, it was far too soon to be, to be weighed down by how crazy and how much work it was. I mean, we were, this was a dream come true. I mean, it was months leading to… making something with our hands, putting it out there, um, having people respond to it.
And, uh, we got so much great feedback. People were so excited. You know, when we were driving, I was driving with my friend to get us set up while Joan and our other friend were back, uh, doing the baking and, um, I had, I had a feeling in my… I had the same feeling in my stomach that I had the day I was getting married.
Like, it just, I had this nauseous excitement, like, almost sweating, but really just like, so excited. And, and it was crazy. It was complete craziness. And it, it was, and it's been complete craziness, but it was so exciting.
And I think, then it became like, okay, how do we really do this? I think that was, that was like, "where's the next place we can sell?" "How do we set that up?" "Do we, how do we do this in any kind of, like, ongoing way to make it viable, uh, as a business?"
Joan: We did debrief with our two pals and at some point we'd end up being just like me and Michelle keeping out the business. And our friends ended up continuing on with their, their current career paths, but it was definitely a special moment to share and they did also value hard work, of course, um, flavor, and just the debriefing process. But paying ourselves back with our, from our startup costs of like sheet trays that Michelle had referenced - 3/4 sheet trays - and flour, and all those things… paying ourselves back that first day told us it was worthwhile to keep testing.
Amanda: You are in your house making bagels. And now you are in a position where you're in farmer's markets. Is, are you experiencing any kind of culture shift? And like, the idea of what your life was is going to be different than what it is now, based on the kind of work that you're doing?
Michelle: You know, at this stage we were building and testing, and I don't think we were yet really thinking like, “what does this mean for our life?”
Like, what is, what is the schedule we're going to have to have? Because we were also, for the first year, trying to find places to sell. So it was a little bit more sporadic. It was like, we would sell, we would be lucky if we could be a fill-in spot at some of these markets like once a month, or something like that.
And so it was a lot of lead up, maybe in that week before, uh, or we would do it, you know, a food festival or something. Um, and we would, you know… God bless our friends. Um, pull in as many people as we could to help us. Um, but it wasn't yet, I think with the regularity or, um, even, like, we were still really just trying to figure it out, to, to begin to think about.
Those pieces became very, very apparent, um, as time went on. And I think they became apparent from the people that were around us, in those spaces early on, like the farmer's markets and things.
Joan: I was microdosing at that point. [00:30:00] Just microdosing toxicity, and microdosing different language, and microdosing hierarchy.
Although I was used to hierarchy, especially when it comes to university work. So that's for sure. And I, but also at some point, and I think we need to, like, really talk about shared kitchen spaces and working with other businesses around you that are food businesses specifically.
I found my voice in food and I knew it was right, because people immediately had a problem with it. Because I was being so delicate and rephrasing things and trying to, like, not to like ruffle too many feathers when it comes to university work. I didn't succeed too much with that, but there are certain things you can't say and can't do. When I was working, um, with hockey players and figure skaters and the like, I remember having a brilliant hockey instructor convey unto me that my use of curse words was undermining my intellect.
Amanda: Oh, fuck that.
Joan: Right, so that's not, that's… there's going to be a hell of a lot more cursing on this pod, but so that just was like one of the many early knocks, and I worked for universities, in which case there's like this feigned sense of decorum sometimes, and you're not directly addressing something. It takes you six emails to address something you can do in like two maximum, because you're pussyfooting around everything.
So with food, with someone who sounds like me, who's as tiny as I am, and as white as I am, going around saying, "get your shit out of my sink. That's my fucking sink. I'm using that to wash" in a shared space, people didn't care for that. And I really kind of had this tension inside between being direct and expressing stuff in a way that I couldn't in universities, to just having people like, want to shut me down for acting like they were [acting].
Michelle: Yeah, it was like this weird, especially because we had come from other careers… a big part of starting BUB, aside from the food, and aside from this nostalgia, you know, tough love culture and all that, though, was also to, to do food a little bit differently.
I mean, I, I bartended, I prepped in kitchens, I served, um, but I didn't manage at, in any of those places. Um, but they were horribly toxic, you know, and, and I, for one time or another, ended up always leaving just because I couldn't take it anymore. The sexual harassment, or the, um, the racism, or the, just, inappropriateness, like, at every turn.
And so, um We were, I think, also excited about the idea of bringing a different kind of professionalism, you know, to, to this space. It doesn't mean, like Joan, I mean, I felt like I could be myself for the first time in my entire career with BUB, um, but that, you know, we wanted to be organized. We had great project management experience respectively.
So we were running, you know, we were running this business in a way that people around us were not running their food businesses. And at the same time though, the climate was so different because it was this like, especially at that point, more, more militaristic, more top down, more toxic, more, uh, very, just extremely male.
And, um, so we were trying to find, I think, ways in that where we were trying to raise the bar while also kind of like let a guard down that we had had in our prior careers while also bringing other people along who weren't used to that, like, you know, entry level hourly workers in food, we're not used to being like asked to, to sit at the table and share their perspectives on things or having schedules built around their availability or, and to be honest, a lot of times it didn't work because it was like speaking a foreign language that people just wanted to know where the rules were and what the things were and like, leave me alone, I don't want to have to, like, put in anything extra. But now we're in a different world and you know, there's, there's space for that, but there still aren't the systems there to support it.
So I'll leave it there, I guess.
Joan: Three words: meetings with agendas. Can you believe people's reactions to, like, having that? And I think, like, there's something about being someone with fresh eyes, like, just that perspective that comes with something that's just been routinized for so long, and lauded as being okay, and us being, like, "nope." Bright-eyed and wanting to just have agendas, to do things differently, to apply the best parts of our former worlds to something that could actually use that help.
And I think that we were ahead of the curve when it came to that, but man, we paid for it left, right, and sideways in terms of peoples’ reactions to it.
Amanda: Oh, I bet, I bet. Um, I think that there's, um, it's kind of like working with programmers when you are at a tech startup. And you know, you're, you're asking them to, you know, code this, that and the other thing. And then you turn around, you ask them a question like, "So how do you think this can be done better?" And they're just like, "no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, I am the monkey. You pay me to be the monkey. You give me my Red Bull and you [00:35:00] let me sit in a corner and you don't; and I do not come to meetings."
"You just tell me what to do. I do the thing and then I go home. Thank you very much." And finding those people who can handle the conversation, that's like a specialized, that's a specialized human being and you don't even realize it. When you're building your own stuff. Like, "you're not thinking about my stuff?"
And they're like, "yeah, no, I'm not. I'm not thinking about your stuff. I don't want to think about your stuff. I just want to go home." And there's nothing wrong with that. At all. At all. But um, but when you need somebody, you know, when you need some input and you're trying to build something, finding that core team that can give you the result, as well as can think about the result, that's tricky.
Michelle: Yeah, and you need people who, um, you need a balance, right? And a lot of those people who are, like, more kind of cogs in the system - and I don't mean that disrespectfully - I think you really need those people.
Amanda: Absolutely.
Michelle: And at a lot of stages where we had some of the best people like that, we just did not have the systems or the operational support in place to really support that.
So you needed somebody who could be more entrepreneurial in their thinking, or at least see the whole picture a little bit better, like recognize that if they don't, if they don't tell you that they used the last bag of flour, tomorrow's schedule is not going to work, but like, they're not used to that.
They're like “the flour's here. I use the flour, I make the thing. I don't have to tell anybody there's no more flour.” And like that kind of stuff happening in a, in a hundred different ways over the course of a day in a small business is, is crazy. I mean, and it's, it's like what really keeps you in the trenches, putting out fires all the time, uh, rather than being able to just build those, uh, roadways where people then can, who want to have the autonomy in their lane can have it, you know. But it's really hard to do that when you're building something from scratch. It takes, it takes time, and it takes the space to be able to be thoughtful about how you do it.
And when you're constantly grinding and trying to find the next place to sell your product that takes two days to make, um, you know, there's not much of that.
Amanda: The next stop would be that shift from your own kitchen to other kitchens. Um, how fast, how fast did that happen? I mean, when, I mean, you, you had your first gig. We, we're now looking for other spots in other farmers markets. When did you know it was, this was time?
Joan: It wrecks your kitchen. The prep that we did for the first event wrecks your kitchen. However, you're in control of your space. If you come back home to mess, it's your mess. You're not worried about people using your smallwares. You're not worried about people adding to the mess. You're not worried about any of your supplies going missing. That's my intro to this for you guys.
Michelle: Yeah. I mean, the biggest thing is space, right? I mean, we ran out of space before and capacity to make things on any scale that's reasonable, um, because to your point earlier, I mean, most of these markets are starting at like 7am, which means we need to be baking at 2 or 3am, you know, um, even with more space. So I think the first thing was like, "okay, we're doing this at some sort of regularity, once or twice a month or whatever, we… the demand is there, so we're making hundreds of bagels every time we go out and we're coming back with nothing," and also this, like, rolling bake idea. I mean, it was, it's not sustainable because, you know, to your question, like by the time you start to realize you're running low on something and there's the turnaround time on making it, I mean, nobody, nobody who does farmer's markets does it. I mean, they make what they make and they come and they sell it - when it's gone, it's gone.
And there's a reason for that because it's like a logistical nightmare, uh, to do that. Uh, and so…
Joan: In the shop it works well.
Michelle: Yeah, in the shop it's awesome.
Amanda: That makes sense in the shop, yeah.
Michelle: So we just needed to, we started to look for places where we could make more in a shorter period of time. Where there were multiple ovens, where there was more refrigeration, where there were multiple, uh, ranges where we could boil more than like...
You know, think about a standard saucepan. You're only boiling four bagels at a time in that thing. Like, you know, so we were getting… we had braisers stretched over burners. I mean, we, we like did everything we could to kind of, uh, hack the spaces that we had. But, uh, the first step was realizing we needed more counter space to be prepping dough and we needed more, uh, storage space to store things.
Joan: You need access at odd hours, and hopefully it would be at times that would not be in conflict with other people because, like, we take up so much space given what we do; which is the type of roles we touch, whether it's like making the dough, proofing the dough, baking off the dough, making the lox, slicing the lox.
Having cream cheese at an appropriate temperature, compounding the cream cheeses. So we looked into different spaces that had commercially-sanctioned kitchens, and that brought us to a couple different options, and that started with churches.
Amanda: But are you, are you looking on, are you looking on Craigslist? Like, you're like, "hey, looking for an industrial kitchen." I mean, I'm thinking, how did you even know these were options?
Michelle: And these, our friends, were still helping us at this time. I mean, we're like, Googling [00:40:00] spaces like that, um, there were not very many in the, in Baltimore at the time. And they were pretty expensive for… you know, we were not doing this at any kind of scale that we could afford that.
We were contacting other restaurants that were not open in the morning, uh, to see if we could, I mean, that's the way a lot of places do it, too. Um, and we were just asking around, so we learned that, you know, local community centers and local churches often had space that was underutilized, and so, we talked to a bunch of people and eventually found some that were willing to work with us at a very modest, essentially, donation to those spaces, um, but those also came with challenges.
[Joan reads from an email begins]
Saturday, January 23rd, 2016.
Hello! I hope you are doing well and tucked in somewhere during this snowstorm. With a little time, I wanted to follow up and thank you for taking me through the community center on Wednesday. I so appreciate your time and openness to working with us. And it seems like your space could work well for what Bottoms Up Bagels needs.
I am still waiting to rule out two other possibilities this week, but in the interim, wanted to get some specifics to you to see if there is a problem with anything we've discussed so far.
1. Schedule. We're looking to use this space the week of February 22nd. This might mean using some time on Sunday the 21st as well, to help get everything in place for the week.
As I mentioned when we met, right now we anticipate being in the kitchen mainly in the early morning, 3am to 7am-ish, Monday the 22nd through Sunday the 28th. If available, we might also use some of it in the afternoons to prep for the next day's baking. We would not need any space outside the kitchen; maybe just a table or two to make things easier.
2. Access. If you do not foresee access being a problem, that is a huge help. I understand if we are provided a key or access code of any sort, we would likely need to sign an agreement, etc.
3. Advanced cleaning/Storage. Also, while we will certainly clean up after ourselves each day, I'm wondering if you have cleaning supplies on hand that we can use to give the kitchen a good scrub - as we would work with any area - in advance? If not, we can supply them. We just had to coordinate the timing with you.
Finally, if necessary, might we be able to store some materials or ingredients in the kitchen prior to that week? We could clearly label anything BUB- related and want to make sure it wouldn't be in anyone's way.
4. Payment. Again, we are excited at the potential for this partnership. If you'd like to discuss any of this further, just let me know.
All the best for a warm and relaxing weekend.
[Joan reading from an email ends]
Michelle: You know, we would be, we would have assigned times we were paying for those spaces, but those kitchens were still being used by other people.
So you'd go in there with like, you know, I'd stop making something at home and like run it, run it across to stick it in this refrigerator of this community center. And there would be, like, five milk crates of, like, little cartons of milk in there.
Amanda: Because they're giving them to kids.
Michelle: So, now what? You know? Um, and, so it just kind of like, lots of communication and trying to just be flexible. And, and even too, like we're finishing up an event, we have to clean up and someone is kind of coming in there because they need to set up for their, um, somebody's birthday party - which is a community space. It should be used for that.
That's one of the reasons we love using these spaces. I mean, we… think about, like, when we did the um, Roadshow in Frederick last year.
Joan: Oh yeah.
Michelle: And the use that that space was getting.
Joan: These are well-loved spaces, but also means that they're kind of worn out. So we really felt good about giving them money towards our time there because they're, they're not underutilized - I'll tell you that much - but they are underserved in terms of which, which fridge is at the right temp.
Are people checking that? I mean, yes, they are sanctioned. And in the case of things [refrigerators] that are a little more sketchy, we would put dough in it because dough was being boiled and baked anyway. But we had to be really mindful and bring our own thermometers for where the lox being held for cure; where was the cream cheese going to be, where were different meats going to be.
And just be super mindful of that, in addition to paying them what were reasonable rates. We also cleaned a fuck ton, because that's how Michelle and I do. And they desperately needed that in some ways. And I understand that everyone's gonna go through ServSafe training or understand, like, what to do.
But I mean we can see some sketchy shit, and I gotta tell you in this one church…
I remember… first of all, the beauty of waking up early and seeing the sun rise or just hearing different sounds. But one sound that was not that pleasant was this one church's hood system, which barely worked. And as you started to get stuff ready to boil and bake, you would hear this wonderful tapping and cooing of what?
Pigeons. Pigeons galore.
Amanda: Oh crap. Oh no..
Joan: I bet you, crap. I bet you.
Amanda: Oh god.
Michelle: Yeah, and this is like Baltimore City in the middle of the night, most [00:45:00] of the time, like most of these places, you know, I mean, we're, it's like, it's, I mean, the one place we were going when we were still working with our friends out of there, we would start baking at midnight, just to have enough, to be able to produce enough stuff to sell. Um, and so, that was for, we did this event, um.
Joan: Those were conventional ovens too, I mean, before you got to convection. So that's why it took so damn long, between that and oven space.
Michelle: Yeah. And then we decided, oh, we were working with a couple of startup groups in Baltimore and they're like, "Oh, we have a space you can use for a pop up."
So we're like, "great, we'll do it for a week. We'll do seven days that we're open selling bagels." And we're still operating in this production model of these, like, you know, church kitchens and, and, uh, at one point, I think we were between our house, a community center, and a church kitchen all at the same time.
So then it was also like, "what is where?" How, like, "what's first in, first out?" Like, all these things.
Joan: You pay for inefficiency. I mean, it was cheaper to rent each place, but then we were fucked in terms of our own personal timing.
Michelle: But it never occurred to us not to do, I mean, this is the, I think this is the difference between somebody who's like, "well, that just doesn't make any sense." Like, "the cost of my time and effort and sanity is not worth the money that I'm making to do this." But I think that's the, also the beauty of being an entrepreneur is like thriving on figuring it out and creating something that people enjoy and being, you know, your own, like putting the use of all of your skills and passions to, um, get to, to, you know, an end point.
And so at that point we were just building, like we, it never occurred to us that this is, too crazy to be doing it in this way. I mean, you knew you had to do it better. I was constantly, like, trying to be more efficient, even in this crazy setup.
Joan: I was powered by “The Drug.” “The Drug” to me is a combination of witty comments from our brilliant customers and money.
I don't, I don't need as much sleep. I don't need fancy clothes or to buy a chef outfit. I need witty comments - that feedback - and money. That's “The Drug.”
Michelle: Yeah. And even, like, on the scale of things, like, very modest amount of money, but it's just, there's something about knowing that you can work harder and you can make more. We had never… we had both been in salaried positions. We were, you know, you're not, every hour extra you're working past six o'clock, you're like, reducing your pay, you know? But, but, so to be in this world where, um, you know, as creative as we wanted to be and as hard as we wanted to work, like, we could… the sky felt like the limit, you know?
Yeah, I think this was the natural point where we were like, “okay, we are onto something.” We started to get a following. That was the other thing. So we're doing it this way. We've, we've done, um, at this point a seven-day pop up in Federal Hill where we had regulars every single day. We are now regularly in farmer's markets as fill-ins for the season, but we're basically doing one or two markets a month.
People are starting - people in the know - at the very, very beginning level, um, were starting to talk about us and like, so that's when I think we were like, okay, this is crazy, but we want to do more, like we want to do more. And then that's like, okay, crunching numbers, can we take this leap to be able to, um, be in a more commercial space?
Uh, I should say, too, that the space that we went into was being built, so it wasn't even like we could have gotten in there sooner if we wanted to, but, uh, I think it was this balance of having traction, having, uh, being able to predict some success in order to take the leap financially, and then just knowing that we were going to make ourselves insane by trying to do it the way that we were doing it much longer.
Joan: I will also say there was an alternative space that we could have been in that was a food hall; that was looking for vendors that we chose not to go into. But I feel like that's kind of bringing us to an episode about gatekeepers, systems, and kingmakers, if you ask me. It's more foreshadowing music. Or maybe systems, gatekeepers, and kingmakers.
[sound effect]
Amanda: That sounds like, yep, I think, I think you hit it.
Joan: Right.
Michelle: Do you want to say something about sheet pans?
Joan: I will say about that one church. I have never washed sheet pans faster in my life. One of the events going on in this adjacent space - and I could hear every fucking thing of this group - was a sex toy party.
That someone was selling dildos, Ben Wa balls, and the like. And they had the most brilliant, if not heteronormative names. One was “The Farmer John.” Forgot that description… And I'm just gonna call the other one “The Burly Baker.” It's a shout out to one of my favorite bakers. And you know who you are. And you're the best, and I miss you.
Michelle: [00:50:00] Aww. But yeah, well-loved spaces.
Amanda: Well, well-loved spaces.
Joan: And inclusive, you know. It's about enjoyment and something or other boundaries, body positivity. And I needed to get the fuck out of there as soon as possible.
Amanda: That is the perfect place to end. Yikes…
Thank you so much to Joan Kanner and Michelle Bond, entrepreneurs and co-owners of Bottoms Up Bagels. I look forward to sharing more of our conversation next week.
You've been listening to Proofing Stage, brought to you by Capers Lovers International. Capers Lovers International. Hey! We don't yuck your yum.
Our theme song, Bagels for the Kraken, was written and performed by Thorn Haze. We also want to cite Pixabay for stock tracks that are really doing some heavy lifting.
If you're looking for a transcript, show notes and additional credits, they can be found on our website: proofingstage.com. Want to join the conversation? Email us at proofingstagepod@gmail.com. You can also find us on Instagram, @proofingstage.
Proofing Stage is produced by Mended Digital. I'm Amanda Schwarz. Until next time, I'll be considering the limits of church programming.