Laura Oleniacz of the Sun Journal recently wrote about the grand opening of Say It With Cake, 1906 Dr. Martin Luther King Blvd. (across from Piggly Wiggly). I was excited about the grand opening because the owner of the new shop, Angela Scamordella, said her store aims to be "super trendy, super modern, and hip." Wow. In little New Bern? Visions of Southern red velvet cupcakes with vanilla cream cheese frosting made with vanilla beans, cupcakes made and iced with super-fruit puree or topped with fresh fruit, and not-so-sweet frosting danced in my head. And I fully expected to see even more exotic flavor combos. After all, bakeries in New Bern are abundant and to start a new one and keep it alive, one should have something to entice customers to come in, buy something and return to make more purchases. To open a bakery with the same type of product that anyone can get while they are grocery shopping at Food Lion, Wal-Mart or Harris Teeter would almost ensure failure. Yet, that's exactly what I found here.
Angela and her mom work together at the shop, and they seem to be a good team. Inventory on hand is light, without much variety. The chocolate cupcakes are unexceptional with typical bakery-type sugary icing with no real flavor. Angela informed me it's buttercream frosting. The carrot cake is pretty good, topped with cream cheese icing that, again, is very sugary with not much flavor. Cookies were wrapped in plastic wrap, not available for sampling. A wall blackboard provides prices.
Angela told me this is not a bakery, but a "cakery." Her forte seems to be cake decorating. When I questioned her on what is "hip" about this place, she replied it was the wallpaper.
My sincere best wishes to Angela and her mom for a successful business venture. I do hope they have a solid 5-year business plan in place to guide them and that they are well connected with friends, neighbors and relatives who can give them lots of business.
