Meet The Founder: An Interview with Silvia Stocchino, Founder of Fairypan Bakery

Where did the idea for your business come from? Tell us how and why you get started.
My passion for baking started when I was little and was a hobby (actually an obsession) during my university years. After I graduated in Art History, I moved from Florence to London and first job was baking cakes and cupcakes for a small café’ in London Excel. I’ve started my professional journey then, I’ve worked with incredible pastry chefs and worked as a NPD (New Product developer) for a big bakery, developing products for M&S that are still on shelves nowadays. I’ve started Fairypan 5 years ago and switched the bakery fully vegan 1 year ago.
What's a typical day like? My day is divided between my studio/kitchen where I bake the orders, my phone where I juggle social media and my laptop where I do my finances, place orders, book couriers pick ups, reply emails. Since the pandemic started it’s been just me on the business so I often reply to emails at night or work on Saturdays.
What is the best part of having your own business? The best part is that I can organise my time around my family and I have every Friday off to spend with my son who is out of nursery. Spending quality time with him, it’s been priceless.

What's the hardest part? The reverse of the coin is that I end up working at crazy hours sometimes and it’s very difficult to pull the plug. Holidays are never holidays as I keep working, replying emails, feeding social media and planning new products.

What’s your best selling product? At the moment is the Brownie Trio, it sells 8 times more than all the other boxes or cakes! It gets shipped nationwide and received incredible feebacks on it!

If you had one piece of advice for someone just starting out, what would it be? My advice is to get help, paid or unpaid. I did everything by myself at the beginning, to save money, but I’ve realised that if I would have got help earlier, like a mentor, my business would have progressed much quicker. Get help from your friends…I often used their hands to pack orders or build boxes!

Let's talk tech. Which softwares do you use in your business? ( Online store, email marketing, scheduling tools, video apps, accounting & banking apps etc) If you're on Shopify, I'd also love to learn your favourite apps. My website is built on Squarespace but I’ll be moving to Shopify next year, after the Christmas madness! Also my email marketing is in Squarespace at the moment but I’ll probably be moving it to Mailchimp soon. I’m not scheduling yet, as I bake cakes as I mostly use what I produce during that day to feed my socials. For accounting I use Xero which is connected to my Santander Bank account.

Which social media platform works best for you? Instagram for sure. It required years of hard work but I’m slowly seeing that my followers are also starting to purchase more and more, which is fantastic!
What business book/podcast/courses would you recommend? Every business book I start I don’t finish it, I’m a bookworm but it’s seems business book are not for me! I love Fleur Emery's online co-working workspace Realwork.

​Where can people find you?
Instagram: @ fairypanbakery
Facebook: @fairypan
Website: www.fairypan.co.uk