Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Gonzalez.
Hi Sarah, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Seven years ago, we came to Nashville on vacation and ended up liking it so much, we bought a house. Yes, while on vacation! We had to go back to the west coast to tell our families that we were moving across the country.
Moving made us a little homesick and I realized that we weren’t the only ones. One of the things people missed the most was food and bakeries. Food is something that connects us to our roots. So, I set out to become the town’s surrogate grandmother, even though I was only in my 30s. I wanted to create a new community of all these transplants and bring people together. Breaking bread became our mission.
I began baking bread for the farmers’ market and soon began selling out almost immediately. By the end of my first year, I had baked for the Governor of Tennessee, moved into a (haunted!) commercial kitchen, gained thousands of followers, and had commercial accounts with high-end restaurants in the area. All without a culinary arts education. We outgrew the kitchen and eventually found a permanent location in an old house in the heart of Spring Hill.
We were so busy, there was regularly a line out the door. Saturdays were insane. It didn’t matter how many cinnamon rolls we made; they were purchased even before we could pull them out of the oven. It was both wonderful and overwhelming at the same time. I was working so much that I didn’t have a life outside the bakery. Soon it all came crashing down. Well, the bakery didn’t. I did.
Even with a full staff, I had overworked myself to the point of collapse. I ended up in the emergency room with a suspected stroke from all the stress. Luckily, after lots of testing, it was determined that it was exhaustion, dehydration, and high blood pressure due to work stress. I had gone past my limit and it was an enormous wake-up call. This wasn’t what I was working for. I didn’t want to be too busy to take care of myself and see my family. We had said yes to so many things and compromised the original goal so much, that we were far away from our original mission.
So, a few months later, I decided to close Spring Hill Bakery as a storefront. Hardest decision ever. This was October 2019 when people were just starting to get sick with this new illness that would eventually shut down the entire world. Impeccable timing. Continuing to feed people and inspiring them to feed others.
When everything shut down in March, we started a cookie delivery service called “Dink Dong Ditch Cookies”. Something to bring smiles to our customers since they’ve always been so good to us. I also moved my baking classes online.
Then, the book deal came. So in between cookie deliveries, I tested recipes, collected family favorites, and wrote my first book, Baking With The Bread Lady. It was published August 31, 2021, with HarperCollins/Zondervan.
I’m also taking on a few speaking engagements, and hopefully working on a second book.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Oh, of course not. But nothing worth it ever is.
One of the hardest parts was saying no. When you’re enthusiastic about what you’re doing, you just want to say yes to everything. So, I never set healthy boundaries. Turns out those are super important! And then when you want everything perfect, it’s hard to let go and let others do the work.
I also had a hell of a time trying to get into a commercial kitchen. When I first started, Spring Hill was really just starting to grow like crazy, so commercial space was difficult to come by. And working on such a tight budget, I really needed to find the right space. We looked at almost 40 places total. Only two worked out. The first was a catering kitchen located in a 19th-century mansion on the south side of town. It was out of the way, not easily accessible, and haunted. But it was enough space to really get growing. In fact, we outgrew the space in three months and had to keep looking for somewhere else. Then after 13 months, the nonprofit that ran tours and events at the house donated it to the city and we were evicted. I had to cancel all my wholesale contracts and move my bakery back to my home kitchen for a year before the next space became available. Sometimes you have to go backward before you can go forward.
The last thing would be labor. We did have a staff of 13, but it still wasn’t enough for how busy we were. We had fairly low turnover, but it seemed like we lost people at pivotal times in trying to grow, so to get new people trained in completely-from-scratch baking with a very small pool to hire from, it made growth super difficult.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
My career has been in a constant state of evolution. After we closed the bakery, I became super-passionate about the legacy of food. More than I was before. Now, I do everything from create recipes, write about how food connects people, teach baking classes, and now working on producing my own show about inter-generational baking.
Locally, I’m known as the Bread Lady. Nowadays, I answer to that far more than I do my own name. I began Spring Hill Bakery in my home kitchen and grew it to be the highest-rated eatery in Spring Hill, TN.
I’m super-proud of what we’ve been able to build; the business itself, the community, and now my new book which I not only wrote but photographed myself.
I think the thing that sets me apart is my focus on the legacy of food. It’s such a deeply ingrained part of us as people, whether it’s our culture, our ancestry, or who we are now. Focusing on that and using it to break barriers, open conversation, and learn about each other, it helps people grow closer together. It doesn’t fix everything, but it’s a great place to start.
Do you have any advice for those looking to network or find a mentor?
I have a few people I would consider mentors, or at the very least, incredibly wise friends with sage advice. And I didn’t meet them at networking events. In fact, some just walked into my bakery one day and we connected. I’ve more or less taken the approach that what is meant for me will find me. I’m not sure if that’s good advice or not, but it’s worked incredibly well.
Contact Info:
- Email: sarah@breadladyskitchen.com
- Website: breadladyskitchen.com
- Instagram: @breadladyskitchen
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/breadladyskitchen
Image Credits
Katie Thomas Photography
