Piece of Cake - Whangarei

The coastal city of Whangarei is home to around fifty thousand people and is the commercial hub of the stunning Northland Region. But the ‘Piece A Cake’ café, in the suburb of Kensington, two kilometres from the city centre, is struggling to get a slice of the action.

Owner and manager Tracey is a qualified pastry chef and a talented cake maker and decorator. She’s worked in hospitality for twenty years on and off, but has never run a business before. After three years of searching, she bought the café with husband Neil who does the books but works full time elsewhere.

They’ve been open 18 months but after failing to turn a profit, the family home is being used to secure a debt of 98 thousand dollars. The only other full timer, Natalie, is a qualified pastry chef with seven years experience but she’s been there less than six months.

The small café of ten tables is struggling to serve enough paninis, salads, cakes and slices to clear $650 a day to break even. Tracey’s dream of owning a cafe is putting her family at risk of losing it all.

John is in Whangarei for the day to work out where the café’s going wrong, but his first challenge is finding it. The drab signage doesn’t do it any favours and he is stunned by the garish colours inside the cafe. He finds the pre-packaged sandwiches say service station rather than café.

John suspects Tracey’s inexperience is costing her dearly and this is confirmed when he gets to the bottom of the numbers she is crunching. She wants her cakes to be a viable part of her business, but she is only selling only four of them a week.

As far as the food goes, there’s no breakfast or cooked food menu on offer so John orders from the cabinet. And he’s not terribly impressed, the presentation isn’t good and while the food is passable, it doesn’t spin his wheels.

An observation of service reveals that, front of house, there is a general lack of professionalism with staff in scruffy uniforms and, in the cramped kitchen, the women are competing for space.

A week later John returns armed with a plan to turn the café around. First on the list is to get them to serve breakfasts but, when he goes to teach them eggs benedict, is horrified to discover….that they have no toaster! However the eggs benedict proves to be a hit and is happily added to the menu.

John is keen for Tracey to step up marketing for selling her elaborate cakes so, together, they design brochures featuring them.

With Tracey sorting out her cake designs, John talks to Nadia about her coffee making skills. He thinks she needs to lift her game, as the coffee she’s making at the moment is too weak. He’s not sure that Nadia has what it takes to pull it off.

Later that afternoon, John makes the team stay behind after closing time, he’s asked them to bake a special batch of cupcakes but doesn’t tell them why. The added pressure of extra work causes emotions to fray.

The next morning John reveals the reason he got them to make cupcakes is to illustrate that sending cupcakes can be just as effective as sending a bunch of flowers, yet much cheaper. He encourages Tracey to push this, as creating new business is key for her to move forward.

With this in mind, he reveals he has another plan for Tracey to create new business; teaching night classes. To keep it interesting, John has rustled up some cooking class guinea pigs, a team who have absolutely no experience in the kitchen. Tracey sets to work teaching the forty-something men in the art of decorating cupcakes.

The following day the café is closed for renovation day and, when John turns up, a team of family, friends and contractors is raring to go. They get to work painting, installing new signage, and reorganising the kitchen so it can cope with the dual demands of café custom and cake making.

With the renovations in full swing, John seizes the opportunity to try and convince Tracey to change her bread supplier. Currently she’s buying bread every ten days and freezing it, but John wants her to start using par-baked breads, which will taste a lot better. The bread is a hit and, while tasting the new sandwiches, Tracey asks him what he thought of the food when he first tasted it. Tactfully he says that he thinks they can do better at presentation and that their sausage rolls need to go. Reluctantly, Tracey agrees to take them off the menu.

John’s ideas to create space in the kitchen are also met with resistance, as Tracey grapples with the logic of John’s plans. In the middle of all this, efforts to move the dishwasher go astray when they discover that there isn’t enough water pressure to run it in its new location. They quickly realise that in order for it to work, they’re going to have to rustle up and install a new hot water tank, and do it quickly.

In the midst of all this chaos, John presents Tracey with some artwork he’s had made for her. He’s taken various pictures of Tracey’s cakes and had them blown up and framed, as decoration for the café.

Outside, with rain clouds looming, the team dash to cover the furniture. However in his haste, John manages to stab himself in the leg with a knive but, it transpires, not everyone is terribly sympathetic to his injury.

Bandaged and back on his feet, John is concerned that there is too much to do before their relaunch the following day.

And worry, he should. Because when John turns up on the morning of the relaunch, he discovers the café is in total disorganisation and he’s not impressed with their attitude.

Leaving part of the team behind to prepare the café, Tracey and Nadia hit the streets, armed with flyers to drum up business for the relaunch. And, unbeknownst to them, they even manage to give a flyer out to the secret critic who they discover in the car park of a supermarket.

In John’s final team talk before opening, he gives out new uniforms and announces there will be a critic in the house. However the new uniforms aren’t the hit John intends them to be, and no one opts to put them on.

Finally they are ready for business, but no sooner than the doors are open that a freak gust of wind strikes and blows over the massive outside planter box, giving all the guests a huge fright. This is not the bang the Piece A Cake wanted to go off with.

However, after that hiccup, the wait staff all manage to cope with the new menu and service appears to go smoothly, with the new menu items flying out of the kitchen.

The critic has praise for service and food, however she is not impressed with the dirty uniforms, or the coffee which she describes as weak and insipid.

Three weeks later John returns to the Piece A Cake and is delighted to see that they’re all wearing crisp new uniforms. He talks to happy customers who rave about the coffee and discovers that the new lunch menu is going really well, as is the cabinet food. Tracey is selling 50% more cakes than when he first visited and that she has plans for night classes.

John leaves, excited for Tracey and The Piece A Café team, and is confident they have a bright future ahead of them.

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