Planning During A Pandemic
Planning During A Pandemic: Wedding Cake
ordering your wedding cake in uncertain times
To kick-start the Scarlett & Bell blog I decided to use the excuse to learn about the ways suppliers who would normally have face-to-face contact with clients, are managing the challenges of the Coronavirus pandemic. I will be finding how it has affected their business, and how they are adapting to the ever-changing requirements and limitations to allow them to continue serving their clients. These are challenging times, however there is opportunity here for businesses to evolve, and perhaps even thrive.
Caked by Catherine
The first instalment of this series focuses on the iconic wedding cake, with two exceptional Edinburgh bakers and designers, Butter & Bodoni and Caked by Catherine. Butter & Bodoni (run by Lauren Rand, pictured below) is relatively new to the bakery scene. After years working at Liggy’s Cake Company, Lauren launched her business combining her skills with baking and her artistic training as a graphic designer. Catherine (pictured above) began baking while her children were young, motivated after not being able to find anything to her taste on the market. She credits her home of Mauritius as the inspiration for her alternative style, which she developed studying under renowned cake artists Tortik Annuchka , Andrey Dubovik and Ronya Belova.
Both have experienced significant set-backs to their businesses over the past months. Butter & Bodoni are less than a year old and so their first year and first wedding season is taking place when weddings and events are impossible. “I laugh with my friends that I picked the absolute worst time to start a business but hindsight is always 20/20 and we just have to keep looking forward!” Catherine has seen all of her celebration cakes being cancelled, however like many of us her weddings have been postponed to 2021 (a challenge in itself!).
Butter & Bodoni
When you begin looking for a baker, two factors are likely to be top of your list: flavour and design. More often than not, you would look to have a consultation (as you would with most suppliers) and a tasting would often be a part of that. Of course social distancing has put a halt to this. Your baker might be able to accommodate a digital consultation, like Catherine who has been able to conduct these via WhatsApp (I also have consultations over Skype, FaceTime, WhatsApp, etc). If your wedding is spring/summer 2021, you do not necessarily need to have your consultation until later in the year when restrictions ease. This option could cause concerns around your ideal baker becoming fully booked on your wedding date, however such do remember bakers can accommodate multiple weddings in a weekend and you could also discuss putting down a deposit so your date is held.
For the design of your cake you will want to have a good look at the website and Instagram of your baker so you can begin identifying details you like. Chances are you have at least one Pinterest for your wedding plans, if you are looking for a bespoke design for your cake, I would suggest pulling a selection of 10-20 images that epitomise the style and feel of your wedding. This is a great place for your baker to start putting together some ideas for you, and is a good task to do in any case to hone in on your theme. It will make selecting all sorts of things easier as you go (such as stationary, florals and your tablescape).
Throughout the last… umm 278 months? Something like that… we have seen businesses evolving and developing new ways to serve their customers. Bakeries are no different. “I really miss meeting my couples in person,” (don’t we all Lauren!) “and I hope very soon I can start doing consultations again but I am happy that the lockdown gave me the time and the motivation to get my sample box service online. It’s something I always wanted to do but never could find the time.” That’s right. If you can’t go to Lauren to sample flavours, the samples will come to you. Six pieces of Butter & Bodoni’s most popular flavours will be posted to your door. I’m tempted to order them just so I can find out what flavours London Fog and Persian Love Cake are!
Catherine has been spending her time planning for the future. “Hopefully [I] will be able to offer masterclasses as lockdown eases,” in the meantime she is being kept very busy and is fully booked for the next two months. Go Catherine! She has developed a new routine for a safe, contactless delivery service, and works alone from home rigorously applying the rules and regulations related to hygiene during COVID. Nothing can stop her from serving her clients!
So how are things changing? Will the process of getting a cake for your wedding be different in the future? “When weddings are able to take place again there will be some extra precautions when delivering wedding cakes to venues,” Lauren explains. “We’ll need to make sure to maintain social distancing but this usually isn’t an issue as the cake is set up before the event so there usually aren’t too many people around at that time anyway.” Weddings and their requirements are likely to change, at least in the short term. Catherine is already seeing more requests for “mini and medium cakes for small gatherings,” supporting the prediction that many people will have smaller weddings and perhaps a bigger celebration in later months.
With people spending more time at home and on their phones, the algorithms on social media that often works against small businesses has turned in their favour. Catherine is one such business that has noticed the change with an increase in her visibility resulting in more enquiries. All wedding suppliers are anticipating an incredibly busy 2021, and the most positively impacted are smaller independent businesses who maybe seeing their first full calendar. Through the pandemic there has been a noticeable shift towards valuing local independents and supporting them however possible. As Lauren points out, this “and the Black Lives Matter campaign has highlighted that we truly can make a difference on a global scale when we all come together and unite under a single cause. I hope the future of weddings will be more inclusive, more creative and stronger from all it’s been through.”
Finally I wanted to pick their brains about the changing styles of cakes and what we are likely to see more of in the coming months. Lauren notes that “the industry is moving away from smooth, perfect cakes to styles that reflect their clients’ individuality and are on the whole more visually interesting.” This is something I LOVE to hear as a frequent and firm supporter of the idea a wedding should reflect the couple, not just a Pinterest inspiration board. Catherine is also “all for textured buttercream” and “hand crafted chocolate sails to add flow and create movement” which features on many of her incredible creations.
As I come to the end of writing this first post we are nearing the lift of some restrictions. The affect this will have on the wedding industry will be minimal with most suppliers agreeing business will not return to normal until 2021. It has been difficult for everyone, though it is important to focus on the positives and adjust to a new reality. As Lauren puts it, “it's been hard to put down my spatula but it has been so valuable to have the time to think, reflect and to plan for the future.”