Bella's Cookies

Bella’s Cookies bakes up a new kind of business and I love it, not because I love cookies, who doesn’t but by differentiating itself through “green and organic” processes that appeal to the current and future clientele.

This is an interesting study in how to market and advertise your new or existing business by focusing on a new, fresh, organic or green way of delivering services or products. Bella’s Cookies is telling story that parallels current consumer trends and leverages business processes into marketing and advertising strengths. The story appearing in the DelMarvaNow!, “Bella’s Bakes Up New Business,” by Nick Roth tells the whole story and illustrates how each business can tell a compelling story to seperate itself from the competition.

After establishing itself as Delaware’s first all-natural and organic cookie company, Bella’s Cookies is expanding its offerings to include other popular desserts like cakes and pies. 

One of the most popular new items, said Mark Leishear, the company’s director of sales and marketing, is the rum cake made with distilled Dogfish Head rum.

“If you take a trip to the islands, you’ll see it there,” he said. “We thought, ‘We can make that here.’ ”

The cakes, saturated with a butter-rum sauce, become “ripped with rum flavor” as they sit, he said. Along with each dessert featured in the company’s new line, the rum cake will soon be available in local stores and restaurants.

“It’s just a happy cake,” Kelly Leishear, the company’s president and baker, said with a laugh. “It came out amazing. People love their rum cakes.”

 

Bella's Cookies

This isn’t the first time Bella’s Cookies has teamed up with Dogfish Head Breweries. Kelly Leishear originally created rum raisin cookies with the Dogfish Head rum and the response was unbelievable, she said. 

“It’s a no-brainer for us,” said Mariah Calagione, vice president of Dogfish Head. “It’s a really cool partnership. I often pick up their stuff at the farmers market; it’s so good.”

Calagione said the cookies have been featured in her company’s Rehoboth Beach restaurant. Dogfish Head even took it to another level, using the rum raisin cookies in ice cream sandwiches. Since the cookies were so well-received, Kelly Leishear started making rum cakes.

She initially made smaller versions to see how well they would sell. When the response was what she had hoped for, she decided to create a bigger version. She hopes her newest creation will also be sold at Dogfish Head’s downtown Rehoboth eatery.

Also now available at Bella’s Cookies are strawberry pies and tarts, chocolate cakes, coconut cake, coco-carrot cake, summerberry cake and an authentic Key West key lime pie.

The new line of desserts came as the demand changed, Kelly Leishear said.

“We look at the demographics and what’s doing well on the East Coast versus the West Coast,” she said. “East Coast cookie sales are just down right now. In this business, you’ve always got to be ready to change. I think that’s hard for people who have been doing it forever.”

Whether you bake cookies or offer accounting services find that one thing that makes you special – the differentiator. And focus an advertising, adwords campaign or create a new marketing piece to present as you’re out in the business landscape building and servicing clients. Go Bella, I’ll be over later for some cookies!

MikeToots_branding is a process of building, like a game of reverse “horse”. You add letters as you build your brand. So add a letter by making what you do stand out.