A small cottage business that started as a way for an 8-year-old to earn money for a new bike has made waves in the Pueblo baking scene, recently taking a top-three spot in the Best of Pueblo contest Have done
It all started last summer when Kennedy Garcia, a student at Villa Bella Expeditionary Elementary School, told her father, Christopher Garcia, that she wanted a new bike. He suggested they find a way to earn a little money to help pay for it.
“Kennedy and I have always enjoyed working in the kitchen together, so I suggested we bake cookies to sell to friends and family to make a little money,” Garcia recalled.
Through the power of social media, he began posting about Kennedy’s fund drive and “it really exploded,” he said. Before they knew it, he had $100 to pitch in for his new bike and the whole exercise “has now become a business,” he said.
Garcia herself is no stranger to entrepreneurship, having run a DJ, event planning and marketing company for 15 years. Nevertheless, he admitted that he “never thought” the father-daughter hobby “would become anything, but we saw an opportunity to do something together.”
Through the Colorado Department of Public Health, they are taking advantage of the Cottage Goods Law that allows them to make the cookies at home and sell them directly to the public. As interest in Kennadi’s Kookies has grown, they are now working towards a manufactured food license so they can sell even more cookies.
“It’s exceeded our estimate. ‘Why don’t we send everybody in America a cookie?’ said Kenady at the beginning. And I knew we couldn’t do it, but it became our goal to ship cookies to all 50 states,” Garcia said.
Again, with the help of social media, in just 75 days, they reached that goal, marking each new state on a map as they sent out cookies.
Garcia said, “With the great response from the community, we asked people who had tried Kennadi’s Kookies to nominate us for Best of Pueblo. We made it into a top five and then we made it into a top three.” Make.”
Top readers voted Taffy their favorite in the Best of Pueblo Dessert category, and both East Coast Pizza and Kennedy’s Cookies were named finalists. After all, who can resist those irresistible cookie flavors like a lightly spiced Pueblo Green Chile, a Hot Cocoa Cookie or Cinnamon Toast Crunch?
“We are going to fight for the top spot next year,” said Garcia.
family matter
Cookie bakers have gotten the whole family involved in the business.
“We decided it would be fun to name the cookies after family members or childhood memories,” Garcia said.
“The Boys” is a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup cookie favored by the Kennedy brothers, Landon and Rowan Champ. The “Chocolate Chunk” is an extra-large chocolate chunk cookie named after the family’s two cuddly dogs.
“Poor Kid’s Cookie,” a nod to Garcia’s grandfather. The cherry chip cookie reminds Garcia of the free cookie samples that he and his siblings repeatedly returned to during King Suppers visits to the bakery, where they expected to receive more than one.
“She told us ‘You’re not a poor kid, Grandpa will buy you some more cookies,'” Garcia recalled.
Garcia’s girlfriend, Carrie Champ, has become “the CEO of quality control and taste testing”, he joked.
Each new batch of cookies is baked with a mini cookie morsel that Schamp happily samples to provide feedback.
“I take my tasting test seriously,” she laughs, but she can’t name her favorite cookie.
Garcia joked, “We’ll have to come up with ‘The Girlfriend’ sample pack that’s filled with different mini cookies.”
Champ isn’t alone in his inability to pick a favorite. Kennedy herself said she couldn’t do either.
Customers favor the Chocolate Chunk and Cinnamon Toast Crunch cookies, Garcia said, but because the pairing “isn’t your average cookie,” flavors include Toasted Marshmallow for Christmas and Hot Cocoa Topped with Peppermint Bark; Apple pie, allspice and pumpkin flavored throughout the fall and Halloween cookies that included the top three candy bar choices, as voted on by Facebook followers.
Garcia is most passionate about the Pueblo Green Chile Cookies, which feature Musso Farms chiles.
“We make them mildly really hot with some of their dynamite-status chiles. They’re really good,” Garcia said.
Kennadi is not particularly outspoken about her business venture, and confides in few of her classmates about it.
“Most of them don’t know,” she admitted, but her best friend, Kali Andasola, helps with deliveries and they sometimes like to wear their matching “Kennedy’s Cookies” T-shirts to school.
To learn more about Kennadi’s Kookies, visit the Facebook page or email [email protected]
Chief reporter Tracy Harmon covers business news. He can be contacted via email or Twitter at [email protected] twitter.com/tracywumps,
