Today we’d like to introduce you to AJ DeDiego.
Hi AJ, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’m AJ, I’m 29 years old and own AJ’s Baking Company. I sell custom cakes and other desserts as well as wholesale baked goods to businesses around Atlanta. I always knew I loved baking and food in general, but for the longest time, it was just a hobby and I didn’t know what I was going to do with my life. After a somewhat rough high school experience, dealing with depression, self-acceptance, and not knowing my true self, I got a degree in mechanical engineering with the idea of having a technical job so I wouldn’t struggle with money. I wanted to go to culinary school but some of my family wasn’t very enthusiastic about the idea and told me that career path would be too unstable and leave me struggling in the future. So, it’s no surprise that by the end of my degree, I knew I had just spent almost six years studying something I had no interest in and had no motivation to find a career in. During my last year of college, I decided to start my YouTube channel and post recipe videos because I knew that food was still my passion and biggest interest, but I didn’t know what to do with it. I figured having that channel by the end of my degree when it was time to find jobs would at least give me something to show for myself. I job-hopped for a couple of years, struggling to find my path and purpose, and when I got hired as a flight attendant, everything started clicking in my head. I had this great job that would pay for my beginning phases of my business, but sadly for the first year, I was too busy and never home to continue filming for my channel, so I had to put it on pause.
After that break, I had time to focus on myself and figure out what I was doing. When the pandemic first began, I was on leave from my job and had the time to start filming full-time, so I did, and it performed very well online, giving me a bigger following and audience. Having that nailed down, I brainstormed how to turn it into a business so that someday I could create my own dream job. Fast forward three years, my one channel has spread to all my social media; I now have a full-fledged business that sells custom cakes and desserts, wholesale baked goods to several Atlanta businesses, an online store shipping gourmet handmade dessert mixes and fresh baked goods nationwide, and even more! My growth and endeavors have landed me several online articles, the front cover of The Georgia Voice newspaper, a published cookbook, and a spot on a Food Network Competition. I had to seriously apply myself and sacrifice a lot to get here, but it was all worth it.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Growing a business from the ground up is far from easy and far from quick. There are so many different factors that go into starting a business, especially a food sales business. It’s not enough to just be good at making food, you have to know how to budget everything, source your ingredients properly, organize income and expenses for taxes, market yourself properly, spread awareness in the community and become involved, hone in on a craft or idea to set yourself apart from the others, and so much more. Social media alone is a full-time job, but when you throw a physical business in, the work never ends. That concept scares a lot of people because not only does it occupy all your time, but it’s quite expensive in the beginning. There are a lot of licenses, certifications, memberships, marketing tools, products for booths/markets/etc., and tools that you never realized you would be required to have, and they all cost money. It adds up. That initial hurdle of all the overhead stops a lot of people from trying to start a brand, and I can’t say I blame them, but I also have to say that once you get past all those initial factors, it’s quite exciting. When you’ve covered all the overhead and have everything you need and can just focus on selling and perfecting your craft to provide for the community, it motivates you. It plants that seed in your mind and allows you to brainstorm on expanding. It’s a terrifyingly exciting process that has opened up so many incredible opportunities so far.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I try to do a little bit of everything because I love having a lot to offer to my customers. My business started with my gourmet handmade dessert mixes. I’ve never seen another company offer that, so I knew it was a unique and potentially profitable thing to sell. While the mixes are popular, I needed to offer more. For a while, I said I was never going to become a bakery and offer baked goods, but here I am selling more of that than anything else. I’m known not only for the mixes but for all my baked goods and my cakes. I sell a lot of custom cakes ranging from simple birthday cakes to elaborate wedding cakes and everything in between. I focus on high quality, strong flavor, and impressive aesthetics. I’ve noticed that a lot of baking businesses have one of those factors nailed down, but it’s rare to find it all in one product, so I wanted to become good at all of those things and offer the best-baked goods around. Being unique with a baking business is difficult because there are so many of us, and so many of us are good at what we do. That being said, baking is a beautiful business because everyone has a unique style. All cake artists have their specific designs and decorations that make them special, and that sets us apart from the rest.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Owning a business is a risk in itself. It’s impossible to predict how the economy will be, what the market will be like, or how you and your product will be received. You can have amazing ideas and products, but that doesn’t always guarantee success. You have to connect with your customers and prove that you’re worth their time and money. My biggest risk to date was leaving my flight attendant job to give my business all of my time and attention to get it off the ground, but without that leap of faith, none of my success would’ve been possible. This isn’t something I can do part-time anymore, it’s my career, and I’m so proud to be able to say that.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.bakeitwithaj.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/ajdediego
- Youtube: YouTube.com/bakeitwithaj
- Other: TikTok.com/bakeitwithaj
