BakeMark's Bakin N Rockin - April 2011 - (Page 6)

Natalie Bakery Dazzles with Unique Cakes and Pastries When bakery shoppers in the Dallas marketplace crave a creatively unique cake or pastry, they know where to go: Natalie Bakery & Pastry. The bakery’s owners Zaven and Svetlana Ratevosyan have carved out a special niche with their carefully prepared cakes, cookies and pastries inspired by the food culture of Armenia and the Middle East, since opening their successful retail shop in 1996 in Plano, TX. Zaven Ratevosyan grew up in Armenia and came to the United States decades ago with a dream to continue the baking tradition of his family. Both his grandfather and father were bakers. Today, he continues the family tradition with his wife, brother Vardan and sister Mareta also working at Natalie Bakery. Ratevosyan knows how to bake, and his delectable and varied selections s of delicious sweet baked goods are proof positive. The baklava at Natalie Baky ery is one example. Here, they t make the traditional baklava that e most Americans know with the d flaky layers of phyllo dough and y rich ingredients inside. But they f also make several other types of baklava known to people of other origins, such as Iranian bakn lava – a drier and lighter version d d i t hi d light that is made with chopped almonds and pistachios and li ht syrup. Ratevosyan wants his bakery to appeal to people from around the world. “When anybody comes in here to buy our cakes and pastries, 95% of the people stay with us and come back to buy more,” he says proudly. “We are influenced by many cultures: Russian, Middle Eastern, Indian. This is not a typical Armenian bakery.” Scratch-made cakes are his calling card, and evidence of how this bakery is embracing new trends in the baking business. Ratevosyan is a self-taught cake decorator and is proud to show his photo gallery of lavishly decorated cakes for weddings and other special occasions. He prefers to work with fresh whipped cream because customers love the flavor, and he also incorporates fondant and buttercream in his cakes at customers’ request. He loves to experiment with recipes and came up with a delicious egg-less cake at the request of his Indian customers. Natalie Bakery sells a minimum of 100 cakes per week and averages three or four wedding cakes for every weekend. Ratevosyan, who spent a good amount on advertising in the bakery’s early years but today relies mostly on word of mouth, loves weddings because he knows that “for every wedding, we will get two to three new customers. Our customers now come from recommendations.” Business at his bakery remains on the upswing, despite the recent economic downturn affecting consumer spending, and y Ratevosyan is hesitant to raise any prices, which he hasn’t done iin years. He knows that he might a achieve short-term gains in profits b raising prices, but he worries by t he might lose a portion of his that lloyal customers, and that is a risk R Ratevosyan says he is not willing t take. to Buying his bakery ingredie from BakeMark helps here ents – because he has been a loyal B BakeMark customer since openiing the bakery 15 years ago. “B k M k h good service, and the price is very reasonable,” he i “BakeMark has d says. “I cannot make good quality cakes if I cannot get the quality of ingredients I need.” Cookies are another integral part of the business at Natalie Bakery. Their cookies come in dozens of flavors – coconut, raisin, walnut and gingerbread, just to name a few. They also make unique kinds like an Armenian favorite called Nazook, a flaky and slightly sweet type of cookie. In addition to retail sales, Natalie Bakery sells 14 kinds of cookies packed in 1-pound trays to ethnic grocery stores in many parts of Texas and surrounding areas. “We provide product to more than 60 stores,” he says. “This is like advertising for us.”

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of BakeMark's Bakin N Rockin - April 2011

BakeMark's Bakin N Rockin - April 2011
Production Ideas -- Liven Up Your Cakes and Cookies
Merchandising Tips -- Tapping into Bakery Shopper Trends
Product Trends -- CSM Bakery Products Debuts TranSmart Cakes
Product Trends
Bakery Profile -- Natalie Bakery Dazzles with Unique Cakes and Pastries

BakeMark's Bakin N Rockin - April 2011