Josie Rudderham and Nicole Miller have big dreams for the small business they started five years ago in a house in Hamilton, Ont.
The owners of Cake & Loaf Bakery Ltd. – a million-dollar business that bakes goods from scratch using local ingredients – want to expand their main location to include eat-in and meeting spaces for baking classes and community events. They also want to build a customer relationship management program that can help them maintain the personal touch that’s become a key part of their brand.
It’ll take a lot of cash – at least $150,000 for the space expansion alone – to turn this wish list into reality. But there’s no stopping Ms. Rudderham and Ms. Miller now; the business partners and former college classmates have won this year’s Small Business Challenge contest, sponsored by The Globe and Mail and Telus Corp., beating out more than 3,300 entries.