Here at Rise we hand bake delicious pastries for the allergy conscious and the everyday folk. Everything we make is gluten free, vegan, soy free, and dye free. We also cater to additional food allergies/preferences such as refined sugar free and nut free. We are the first bakery of its kind here in West Michigan and pride ourselves on making baked goods that everyone can enjoy.
We are currently operating our bakery out of Crossroads Bible Church and deliver our baked goods to a dozen coffee shops in the downtown area. We also take custom orders and cater weddings as well as large events. With our growing business we are in need of our own storefront and commercial kitchen to better serve our thriving customer demand. Having our own storefront will ensure our customers of an allergen free environment and help support the increase of production. We expect that financial roadblocks may occur in the build out phase of this project but plan to use Kickstarter as a means to raise funds.
Impact
Having a retail storefront will allow our customers to be able to stop in and grab pastries without having to place a custom order or search for specific products at our coffee shop vendors. With added space for production we will be able to reach more folks with food allergies/preferences. We plan to maintain our small batch and hand crafted feel but increase our reach to more wholesale vendors, including grocers and additional coffee shops along the lakeshore.
What I Will Do With $5,000
If we were to win the $5,000 grant with 5x5 Night we would use it to cover some of our costs for our retail storefront/commercial kitchen. Commercial kitchens are extremely expensive to build and $5,000 could cover part of the cost for our hood vent. A hood venting system is the first necessity for building a commercial kitchen for our bakery. Although $5,000 would not cover all the costs of our build out, it would be extremely helpful to our small business and growing family!
