Good morning everyone all over the world!
Many thanks to MentorshipZim for giving me this opportunity to tell my business story.
My name is officially Theodora Chinembiri though I am slowly defaulting to my maiden Madzinga, having recently divorced.

I run my own business called Tasty Treats by Theo, TTT. I started off in 2009 doing Catering and Decor. Over the years I shed off Decor and instead learnt to bake. TTT is now a Baking cum Catering Venture.

Before I start, let me put this out there. I LOVE MY JOB! It's a serious passion and I get a kick out out of the whole deal, prospecting for business, closing deals, purchasing, running logistics, executing the work and delivering to the customer.

I am one of the privileged ones who love what earns them a living!

I started off in Banking, working for a large multinational bank that trained its staff very well. That's where I learnt world class standards of service and I did get a few awards over the 10years I was there.

My job (as well as myself) took me to Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, Hongkong and African countries. Each flight I sat in, each hotel I slept in, I ALWAYS fascinatedly watched the food presentation and tasted a lot!

I always revere entering a hotel room the first time. I watch out for my first impressions and feelings, the sight, the scents and smells, the look! That's what undergirds my work: I visualise a customer who is receiving their product from me. Their first -

- impressions, the way their face lights up and they go Wow!
Over the years I learnt to achieve beautiful, clean, neat plating of food that tastes as great as it looks. Yeah that's our tagline - TTT for food that's tastes as good as it looks

I left the bank for family reasons in 2008. You remember how tough that time was? Well i started baking scones for hubby to sell to his colleagues in the office. I also started doing cakes for friends and their kids. However, I was not even serious at it.

In 2009, my Pastor asked me to head the Pastor's Lounge for one of our Church conferences. I was scared and I argued with him for a while. I was like Man, its not yet my time. But bless Pastor Chemani Tuturu, he insisted.

I organised a team of helpers and cooked for 7 consecutive days, for the first time ever! We served the Visitors Lounge, Pastor's Lounge and Guest Lounge for the VIPs. I got other ladies to head the first 2 and I served the VIPs.

Well that was it! Without knowing it at the time, TTT was birthed. Over the next 2 years I became the church default Caterer. I cooked please, again I say, I cooked! It wasnt always rosy. One time, 4 or 5 ladies were supposed to come to help cook dinner -

- and all of them gave excuses. I singlehandedly cooked the meal with the help of my young sister. And I was suckling an infant.
Guess what, every plate I served spoke well for me and slowly, the requests started coming in.

In summary, over the years I have cooked for thousands of functions including weddings, church functions, family functions, funerals, birthdays, corporate events, festive parties and many more.

The lowest number I have served is 1, a surprise birthday 2 course meal delivered at work. The highest is 1470. We were paid to cook for a wedding of 800, but they must have known there wld be quite a crowd because they gave us too much food -

- to cook and we served 1470 plates! Zuva randisingakanganwe. We got to a place where the hand got mechanical. Dig in a portion, shove into a plate, din in for the next, on and on!

Another time I did 3 consecutive sundays for a political rally. I got paid to cook for 1000ppl, ihiiii, the first Sunday was okay. Then word got round that there is a caterer. Let me just tell you that village ppl love to queue up and shout, "Vambodya avo!"

Time for school run, will be back!

That's how I started Catering. My baking story is more straightforward. I struggled a lot with depression, esp within my marriage. In 2016 I was in and out hospital a lot! A lovely friend, @Chikitautau2 called me one morning and said are u aware that baking is therapeutic.

We argued for a few days then she literally commanded me to get out of bed and go to her baking school for a free lesson. She made me pay for ingredients only and gave me lessons in buttercream cake, fondant cake, cupcakes and fruit cake. Thank you Tau!

Did I not just enjoy myself!!!!
Standing back to look at that first cake lifted my heart so much that I quickly got into the business mode. Within a week of those lessons, I made my very first ever cake for a customer, a freebie though. I baked for my helper's son, a builder.

When I look at that cake, I want to run away. What was I doing? I didnt even know I cld have googled for builders themed cake ideas! Shem

But guess what? I was so proud of that cake, yoh! The way Kudzie loved it! The way my helper said kids in Epworth lined up to get a piece of the fondant! They even fought for the board so they cld lick it
I will never ever despise my humble beginnings!

Since Kudzie the builder's cake on 1 Dec 2016, I have executed close to 1000 cake and cupcake orders.
I try to keep meticulous records. I can barely wait for my 1000th cake. One cake can be 2, 3 or 5 tiers with a minimum of 2 separate cakes inside.

The lockdown didnt spare TTT as well BUT I have no single complaint! The only depressed month was April when lockdown started. I did only 13 orders then work started coming in. My highest month was Sept, I did 52 orders.

The highest number of orders I have done in one day was for mother's day in May when I had 15 orders. Shem, we worked! And half of them were deliveries as well I learnt a lot that day, will share on that later

During the lockdown, I branched into snacks and savouries. I used to subcontract others before when someone ordered samosas or pies. Now I do everything myself and it was a great business move as snacks sell better than proper meals.

Given a choice whether to cook a 3 course meal, bake a cake or do snacks, I would choose snack platters. I love plating food and they give me the best opportunity to present the food beautifully. I also get the best taste feedback when I serve snacks.

For those starting out, I suggest doing snacks. If you are not confident of making tasty fillings, just buy from a supermarket then you do a great job of frying and baking the stuff. Or come for a lesson and I show you how easy it is to fold a samosa.

Of all the savouries I can do, cocktail pies are the hardest for me. Haa those things can refuse unity at times (anoramba kunamana). But we soldier on and hopefully I will find someone who can show me an easy way to work with puff pastry.

Cucumber bites and fruit kebabs are the most sought after and most complimented on. Maybe because we all like veggies and fruit. I once did a Strawberry and red grapes combo and this customer insisted I had added something to make them tastier

From 1 Jan 2020 till last night when I catered for 48ppl, I executed a total of 406 baking and catering orders worth $15 617us.
I operate from home in Westgate and I have a pool of over 30 casual employees that I select from when I have a job.

I am thankful to Jehovah for that kind of sales. I have never aggressively marketed my work, I only put up my cakes on my whatsapp profpic and that's where I get orders from. It's only now, thanks to @kedukudzi that I am spreading my wings on social media.

In 2021, I am going to open a baking shop/school. The business has seriously outgrown the home and I am praying @OldMutualZW is going to help me set up shop at Wetgate shopping complex, 2km from my house. The rentals are beyond my reach, but I remain hopeful!

That's it for my business story, how I got into it.
I will come back after 2pm and share the following:
Revenue streams from baking and catering
How to get the very first customers
The importance of people skills
The pros and cons

Having a strong social support system.

And then I will end on a brief personal note of how baking is healing my broken heart from depression after a 19year marriage. I hope my business story will inspire someone who also struggles with depression or feelings of rejection by man.