Sweet Creations owner Sana Aziz, right, and assistant manager Brandi Palmore. (By Michael Thompson)
After outgrowing her home kitchen, a local baker has fired up her ovens at a shop in Midlothian.
Sana Aziz opened Sweet Creations Bakery in late October and will host a grand opening for the shop Nov. 23. She signed a one-year lease for the 1,470-square-feet space at 12012 Southshore Pointe Dr. in the South Shore Shops.
Sweet Creations Bakery produces pies, pastries, bread and cakes for its retail, wholesale and catering operations.
“If you can think of it, we can make it,” Aziz said.
The bakery offers pies, pastries, bread and cakes.
Aziz and her husband moved to Richmond in 2001. She did stints as a baker at Jean-Jacques Bakery in Carytown, as an executive pastry chef at VCU and at a local cupcake shop.
Two years ago, the mother of two started baking out of her home, selling at farmers markets across the region and taking special orders.
She built a following that demanded more treats than she could handle at her house.
“My bakery got too big for my house, which was kind of the plan,” Aziz said.
Aziz said she had dreamed of opening a bakery since she was 5, when she got her start baking for her family in New Jersey on a secondhand Easy Bake Oven. She eventually went to Johnson and Wales University in Rhode Island, where she received degrees in baking and pastry arts and a bachelor’s degree in food service management in 1999. After graduating, she landed a job at Ball State University as a pastry chef and kitchen manager in one of the school’s dining halls.
Aziz financed the $150,000 launch of Sweet Creations with a mixture of personal savings and business credit accounts.
“This was my 40th birthday present to myself,” Aziz said. “The plan all along was to have my own bakery by the time I was 40.”
Her most expensive piece of equipment was an oven that ran about $6,000.
Aziz hired four employees to help her make cannoli and tiered wedding cakes, and she keeps the shop open six days a week. To keep the ovens on, Aziz said she would need to sell 25 to 50 cakes a month at about $35 each.
Sweet Creations also sells coffee by Charlottesville-based Greenberry’s Coffee and other beverages.
Aziz said she might look to franchise the brand.
Inside the 1,470-square-feet space at 12012 Southshore Pointe Dr.
Sweet Creations owner Sana Aziz, right, and assistant manager Brandi Palmore. (By Michael Thompson)
After outgrowing her home kitchen, a local baker has fired up her ovens at a shop in Midlothian.
Sana Aziz opened Sweet Creations Bakery in late October and will host a grand opening for the shop Nov. 23. She signed a one-year lease for the 1,470-square-feet space at 12012 Southshore Pointe Dr. in the South Shore Shops.
Sweet Creations Bakery produces pies, pastries, bread and cakes for its retail, wholesale and catering operations.
“If you can think of it, we can make it,” Aziz said.
The bakery offers pies, pastries, bread and cakes.
Aziz and her husband moved to Richmond in 2001. She did stints as a baker at Jean-Jacques Bakery in Carytown, as an executive pastry chef at VCU and at a local cupcake shop.
Two years ago, the mother of two started baking out of her home, selling at farmers markets across the region and taking special orders.
She built a following that demanded more treats than she could handle at her house.
“My bakery got too big for my house, which was kind of the plan,” Aziz said.
Aziz said she had dreamed of opening a bakery since she was 5, when she got her start baking for her family in New Jersey on a secondhand Easy Bake Oven. She eventually went to Johnson and Wales University in Rhode Island, where she received degrees in baking and pastry arts and a bachelor’s degree in food service management in 1999. After graduating, she landed a job at Ball State University as a pastry chef and kitchen manager in one of the school’s dining halls.
Aziz financed the $150,000 launch of Sweet Creations with a mixture of personal savings and business credit accounts.
“This was my 40th birthday present to myself,” Aziz said. “The plan all along was to have my own bakery by the time I was 40.”
Her most expensive piece of equipment was an oven that ran about $6,000.
Aziz hired four employees to help her make cannoli and tiered wedding cakes, and she keeps the shop open six days a week. To keep the ovens on, Aziz said she would need to sell 25 to 50 cakes a month at about $35 each.
Sweet Creations also sells coffee by Charlottesville-based Greenberry’s Coffee and other beverages.
Aziz said she might look to franchise the brand.
Inside the 1,470-square-feet space at 12012 Southshore Pointe Dr.