Page 38 of Take My Breath Away
“Excellent, thank you Perry. It’s all we can do for now so you might as well finish for the day.”
I’m more than happy to escape the spotlight of Elliot’s keen gaze. Telling him I’ll see him soon, my back muscles twitch with the weight of his stare following me out as I leave.
* * *
“It’s hard work. It’s harder than you ever imagine it would be. It becomes your life. If you’re not there doing the baking, you’re spending time thinking about new recipes and new offers, experimenting with new flavours which more often don’t work than do. And then there are the customers. Most are lovely but some are a pain in the arse. Nothing’s ever quite right, and they moan — very loudly — about what they think is wrong, then they come back and do it all again the next day. Honestly, we had to ban one man, he was so rude to the staff and other customers. And talking of staff — we’ve been lucky, touch wood — but last Christmas we had to hire a couple of temps and I walked into the store room and found one of them with a ring donut hanging off his, well, you know what. Fortunately Mabel, who’s our senior assistant, was on duty and she threw him out. She’s very brave, and feisty. We took all the ring donuts off sale, and it was a good few weeks before I could even think about reintroducing them. On top of that, there’s all the ordering, the invoicing, and the balancing the books stuff which is vital but really, really boring. Owning and running a bakery-café is a nightmare except when it’s a dream and then all the late nights and all the early starts are totally worth it.”
Rory, who’s barely taken a breath, at last runs out of steam. He flops back into his seat with a wide smile, and Jack joins in.
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen my friends, mainly because their lives have changed so much and that life is the antithesis of mine. They’re now a family, and for the next couple of hours or so their baby girl Bella is in the care of the nanny. The bakery-café is a piece of cake to being parents, they always say, and although the two of them look tired, the happiness and contentment with their lives shines stronger than the sun.
“So, the focus is commission work, with a small café attached? That’s right, isn’t it?” Jack asks.
“Yes. As far as the café side’s concerned, I want to go high-end as my thinking is that it’ll also serve as a kind of advert for, and supplement, the commissioned work.”
“Hmm, that’s one option I suppose. Where are you looking to set up?”
“Brighton. I’ve had a few changes in my life recently, and it’s the right time to move away and make a new start somewhere fresh, away from London. Brighton seems a good place to do it, and being by the sea is a huge bonus as I love the coast.”
Move away… A fresh start….He says it with such conviction my stomach drops. Pretty much the only time I ever leave the city is when I’m getting on a plane to go somewhere hot and sunny or cold and snowy. If I’m honest very little exists for me outside of the M25. It’s another mark of how fundamentally different Perry and I are, I suppose.
“Good choice.” Rory nods. “Busy town with the right demographic for your offer. And commissioned, or bespoke, or made to order celebration cakes — call it what you want — is big business. It really is booming, and there’s lots of work out there, because people are increasingly looking for something different.
“But,” Rory says, leaning forward, “if you really want to have a small café attached to it, to attract those with plenty of disposable income you’d have to offer not only the high-end products but also gluten free, veggie and vegan choices. We’re selling more and morefree fromgoods in the shop. It’s an expanding market. If you don’t, you run the risk of filling your seats with pensioners looking for cups of tea and toasted teacakes. No offence to senior citizens, of course, but they can make a cuppa and a slice of cake last for ages. That’s a hell of a lot of baking in addition to the commissioned work — and that means employing good, reliable staff. They’re harder to find than you’d think. If you get the staffing wrong, it can be a nightmare.” Rory shudders.
Ring donuts as dick decorations, anybody?
All of this is what Perry needs to hear, this is absolutely what he needs to know, although I’m not so sure about Rory’s agreement that Brighton’s the right place to do it all in.
“Rory’s right, it’s incredibly hard work and having a small team of solid gold staff is crucial,” Jack chimes in. “It was a big help that Rory used to work as a pastry chef, but a lot of this stuff we picked up as we went along and we’re more than happy to share what we’ve learned — about what’s worked as well as what hasn’t.”
“It’s the commissioned work that really interests me, I want that to be the focus. Maybe having a café side business would be too much.”
“To be honest, I think it would. Have you accepted any special orders? From strangers, I mean? Don’t take this the wrong way,” Rory says, a flush filling his face, “but making a birthday cake for friends or family is a lot different to charging mega bucks for somebody’s wedding cake.”
Perry smiles. “Yes, I have, quite a few times, and I’m not just talking about a Victoria sponge. I’ve made…”
He rattles off what he’s already told me. Perry’s enthusiasm is infectious, and I can’t help but feel proud of him. Both Rory and Jack’s eyes widen when he tells them about the specialist courses he’s taken, but their eyeballs all but burst from their sockets and roll around on the floor when he shows them his portfolio of photographs, the ones he showed me weeks ago, and tells them about the hotels he’s supplied and the corporate work he’s carried out.
“Wow, that’s really impressive,” Rory says. “And your sugarcraft, it’s amazing — so you already know how time consuming this type of work is, and how clients want everything yesterday.”
Perry laughs. “You can say that again, but I was fitting it in around a full-time job. I think that’s one of the things that made it so difficult. But going forward, the big stumbling block I’m coming across is finding the right premises, in the right location. I’ve scoured the internet, but the commercial premises available are so expensive, even ones that would involve a lot of compromise…” Perry shakes his head, his eager smile fading.
“What’s your opinion, James?” Rory asks. “You’ve been very quiet on the subject. What do you think Perry should do?”
Stop thinking about going off to Brighton or anywhere else by the sea, and stay here.
“You only get one shot at life.” I try to sound more light-hearted than I feel. “Yet, there are always practical considerations and many businesses fall at the first hurdle.”Ouch.Perhaps that’s not what I should have said as three pairs of eyes laser into me.
Jack nods. “You’re right. It’s a sad fact that many businesses opened by people with more enthusiasm than cold, hard business sense collapse within their first year of trading. But that doesn’t mean you don’t try if that’s what you want to do. As Rory said, we do a lot of commissions and it’s a growing and very lucrative market. For us, though, it runs alongside the bakery-café which is our core business and main love. You don’t have to have a physical presence on the high street, not for commissioned work. But you already know that, as you were renting kitchen space, not running a café — that’s what you said, wasn’t it?”
Perry nods. “But I think I just got lucky with the old couple who had the café.”
“Maybe,” Jack says, “but the point is, you should ditch the idea of a café if that’s not your focus — and it isn’t by your own admission. Which means there are other ways to approach this, which in turn widens your options.”
Perry leans forward. “How do you mean?”
He’s looking intent and focused and even in the pub’s low lights I can see his eyes are sparkling.
