Successful Newport baker shares her passion as she lives out her dream

Independents have, after all, had so much to contend with including Brexit challenges, rising energy bills, a cost-of-living crisis and a global pandemic.

Trying times, indeed, but on occasions we've also heard how challenges, such as Covid, have inspired people and changed the course of a person's life.

Imogen Kelly, 24, is a case in point. It was during the first lockdown of 2020 that her talent for baking fully came to the fore, and, she says: 'my cake journey began'.

It ultimately persuaded her to change her career path from teaching.

Teaching's loss has been the sweet-toothed, cake-loving community's gain. Her first shop – Immi's Cakes and Bakes, in her home town of Newport – is thriving, gaining a wide reputation for delicious treats and selling out most weekends.

Imogen says baking has always been a passion but she started to take things seriously during the pandemic, while studying at The University of Warwick.

“It’s all happened very quickly,” she said. “I set it up during lockdown, literally from my mum (Hazel) and dad’s (Tim) home in 2020.

“I was at university doing Education Studies to become a primary school teacher and was writing my dissertation in my third year.

“But I have always baked with family and friends and I just needed a distraction during that time. I baked my mum a birthday cake and posted a picture on Facebook.

“I started to get messages from people asking if I could make them a cake. That’s how it started. I set up Immi’s Cakes and Bakes on Instagram and now I have my own shop.

“If it wasn’t for lockdown, I would have gone into my teaching. I did graduate and have my degree to fall back on but I finished university and went into this full-time.”

Imogen, who won a contract to bake 22,000 cookies for the Polar Express at the Telford Steam Railway two Christmases ago, was 'lost for words' after securing her first in St Mary's Street last year.

It was, she said 'a dream come true' and she has not looked back.

"It has been extremely busy," she reflects. "I thought January and February would be quiet but it has been heaving.

"We have been selling out nearly every week with queues out of the door so I can't thank people enough. It's going extremely well and I am very happy.

"It's surprised me how quickly we have been growing but I have been working extremely hard promoting the business on social media and making sure the customers are happy.

"I take a lot of pride in making sure our customers are satisfied and we have good, quality products, that are fresh."

The shop is currently open on Fridays and Saturdays but Imogen spends the rest of the week baking celebration cakes and producing goods for wholesale. It is hard work but very rewarding, at the same time, she says.

"Last Friday, I spent 20 hours at the shop but that's the kind of sacrifice you have to make when you have got a small business," she adds.

"You have a lot of processes to work through. So, for example, with the the cookies, the dough has to be made up, then chilled, rolled, weighed out, shaped, chilled again, cooked, filled, decorated and chilled again."

"It's a big process and that's just one type of cake or cookie. We have over 50 products on the counter so you can imagine why there are long hours falling into place! We have to work like robots.

"We have a small team for the amount of cakes we churn out but you have to just keep going with it. You do have to work crazy hours to achieve your goals but we have a passion for what we do.

"I enjoy it and Newport is great. There's a lot of support amongst the traders and we all try to compliment each other to be honest.

"I always say it's nice to support your fellow local businesses because, at the end of the day, we are all in the same boat. Having the support of people in the town has also been really lovely."

That customer support has widened and Imogen is gaining quite a reputation further afield.

"It's great because I have been getting people come from further away, whether that's Stafford, Cannock or the other side of Telford," she says. "It's out of the way for some but they have been travelling to see me and that's flattering."

"Someone even came from Surrey to Shropshire and we were on their list of places to go one weekend. It's lovely to hear those stories."

Her cakes are even being tasted on another continent, she says, thanks to Green Fields Farm Shop, to whom she supplies cakes.

"They send our brownies and rocky roads off to the Army and they have been dispatched to teams working on a project in Kenya," she reveals. "So our cakes are going there at the minute which is really cool!"

Such success means Imogen has her sights set on future expansion both with her current shop and further afield, one day.

"In the future, I'd love to expand," she said. "My dream was always to have this shop in Newport.

"Now I have it, I am always thinking 'what's next?'

"I'd like to start opening more days here, first, and introduce a Thursday or late-night desserts. We have a coffee machine up and running and I'd like to produce milkshakes too.

"But I'd also love to see expansion into other towns within the Telford and Shropshire area. Who knows, I could look further afield when I am a bit older."

And the teaching skills she achieved while doing her degree are also unlikely to go to waste, Imogen says.

"I have been doing workshops and baking classes recently, with people one to one and have some coming up this year," she said.

"People can come in, learn to bake and create things for themselves.

"I'd like to introduce children's workshops and parties where they can come in and decorate cakes, or do baking. So I'd still be using those teaching skills.

"Those skills are always there to fall back on but I have no regrets about choosing baking. It's my passion and I'm loving every minute of it."