The FINANCIAL — The bakery Cream Caramel, which opened three month ago in Tbilisi, is enlarging its network and adding a Mexican café to its branch. According to its founder Khatia Kiguradze, in the nearest future Cream Caramel products will be available in other branches. She also reveals the success story of her little but tasty business. She says that staying optimistic in any situation helped her to fulfil her dream and create her own bakery.
“From my childhood I always wanted to have my own bakery. Last summer I was in the USA and saw lots of the little bakery/cafés there. I was inspired by many of those cafés and so decided to create my own bakery in Georgia. When I came back to Georgia I managed to fulfil my dream and already have my very own little bakery Cream Caramel,” Kiguradze says.
Kiguradze, who studied the profession of lawyer at university, says that she has been lucky in business. She thinks that luck has lead to the motivation, desire and optimism of which she is always full.
“I always try to remain optimistic and my wishes mostly come true,” she says
“Actually I have taken on an agreement for a lease of the premises of Cream Caramel. After coming home from the USA I started to collect the documents necessary for an establishment to be registered as an L.T.D and gave the name to the bakery at that time. Everything happened very fast,” Kiguradze told The FINANCIAL.
According to Kiguradze the main point of her success story is that she never gives up.
“There were some problems we encountered for example with ventilation, which could not be installed here and I actually planned to have bakery together with a café, but we had to rent a second place for that purpose which is fortunately not far from here. At the moment everything is all right and Cream Caramel has had a good start. We opened in summer when most of the people were on their holidays, but even during the summer our clients came and visited us. It’s only been 3 months that we have been working and I expect much from the future,” Khatia Kiguradze says.
The founder of Cream Caramel hasn’t yet revealed which is the best selling period in their bakery. There are some cases when none of their products are left and all of them have been sold, but there are also cases where they serve only a few clients during the day.
“Fortunately we haven’t had any drops yet and at the moment Cream Caramel is working well, of course we can’t talk about profits because it’s a bit early. Supposedly we plan to open some cabin type branches. I myself take part in baking some cookies and pastries. Sometimes I get up in the morning with the idea of baking a new biscuit and sometimes spend the whole day trying to perfect it,” Kiguradze says.
“Our clients are satisfied with the product that we offer in total because the whole staff of Cream Caramel works for the pleasure of the client. I always tell my bakers to bake cookies as if they were baking for their family. I think that it’s very important to have a good relationship with clients and make them pleased with their surroundings; we always try to be kind to our consumer and keep in close relations with them,” Kiguradze says.
Khatia Kiguradze says that she is very friendly to her staff and always tries to avoid conflicts between them. She bakes cookies with them every day and asks them to bake cookies as if they are doing to for their family members.
“The minimum price for a product in our bakery is GEL 0.80 and maximum – Gel 5. We have many sorts of cookies including different bakery products, pastries, croissants and salads. We constantly give some of our products as presents to our clients and we do not do that for the sake of their loyalty. We just want to do them a favour and in our own way, please them. Our clients know that they are able to choose one product as a gift when they buy something here and they seem content with that sort of ‘buy one, get one free’ policy. I don’t plan to raise the prices, we want to concentrate on the products which are the most demanded,” Kiguradze says.
As mentioned above on 1 October a Mexican café on Kiacheli Street will be opened. According to Kiguradze they have invited a famous cook from abroad who is Georgian but has much experience in cooking Mexican food.
“Georgians like the taste of chilli and spice and Mexican cuisine is full of chilli. The environment and décor in the Mexican café will be totally corresponding to a Mexican style and I’ll do my best to make clients feel comfortable and satisfied. I plan to create a network of Cream Caramel and add some fast food facilities which will work 24 hours a day. We are selling only our own production to clients; Cream Caramel has its own bakery and we offer our clients only the testiest pastries and cookies,” she says.
“In the nearest future we also plan to have some corporate clients and serve some companies at events or venues. We also plan to take our products to the black sea resorts in Georgia by next summer. In our view, we are quite successful competitors to the wide scale bakeries existing in Tbilisi.” Kiguradze explains.
Bakery chain Entrée has existed in Georgia for nearly a year and accordingly is of larger scales. Entrée was opened in 2008 in Tbilisi. Currently they have three branches of their café: On Rusataveli Avenue, in Vake on the corner of Taktakishvili Street and Abashidze Street and on Ts. Petriashvili Street.
“Together with our French partner we are focused on turning the Entrée branches into “islands” of French cookery and fine cuisine, according to the wide assortment of products, diverse menu, ambiance and exemplary customer service. All Entrée products are cooked under the direct supervision of our staff of highly trained French chefs and cooks,” Entrée officials note.
“We are already very popular in Tbilisi and many people visit us every day. In total, out of the three branches a combined 800 people visit us every day. We plan to add one more branch to our network in Saburtalo,” Lika Miqautadze, Consultant of Entrée explains.
According to Miqautadze in the near future they plan to take Entrée products to Ukraine and to some other post soviet countries as well.
Written By Tako Khelaia
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