How do you get your first 10 home bakery orders without an Instagram following?

Home Bakery Business First ordersMarketingWord of mouthStarting out

Every piece of advice I find assumes I already have an audience. I have 140 followers, most of them relatives, and I am not comfortable being on camera.

For those of you who built a home bakery without going viral — where did your first genuine orders actually come from? I am looking for the unglamorous version.

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3 replies

Mine came from three places, in this order: my children's school parent group, a neighbour who ran a small office and needed something for a farewell, and a local gifting shop that wanted a supplier they could rely on for festival boxes.

None of it was social media. All of it was being physically nearby and consistently reliable.

Sampling, unglamorously. I made small boxes and gave them to about fifteen people who were well connected locally — a salon owner, two teachers, the woman who runs the building association. Roughly a third of them ordered within two months, and a couple of them still refer people two years on.

Priya, the pattern in both replies above is the one we would point you at: your first orders are geographic and relational, not algorithmic.

A few additions that consistently work. Pick one thing to be known for rather than offering everything — being the person for a specific product beats being a generalist nobody remembers. Be genuinely reliable on time, because in the first year reliability generates more repeat business than excellence does. And ask every satisfied customer for one introduction rather than for a review; it converts far better.

On social media, you do not need to be on camera. Consistent, well-lit photographs of the actual product, posted regularly, do the job for a local bakery. The follower count matters much less than whether the last five posts look like something someone would pay for.

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