Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Kyrsten Willits. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Kyrsten , looking forward to learning from your journey. You’ve got an amazing story and before we dive into that, let’s start with an important building block. Where do you get your work ethic from?
I definitely got my work ethic from my mother. She raised me and my two siblings as a single mom, working the night shift as a corrections officer so that she could be with us during the day. I couldn’t have known all the sacrifices she made for us as a child, but as I’ve become an adult I can better appreciate how hard she worked and all the sacrifices she made especially doing it all on her own. She raised me to be a hard worker, to never stop learning, and to follow my heart..
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
Kyrsten’s Sweet Designs is a home-based sweets business, specializing in custom designed wedding cakes, styled cupcake displays & decorated sugar cookies!
The main focus of my business is weddings cakes! All of my work is custom-designed and original to each couple’s love story.
I would describe my design style as romantic & whimsical – inspired by details anywhere from wedding stationary to floral patterns – and almost always including fresh local flowers!
I bake all of my wedding cakes, cupcakes, and cookies fresh each week from scratch, with all-natural, high-quality (local, when available) ingredients and LOVE. I believe that flavor is just as important as appearance!
My ultimate goal for each couple’s wedding day is to provide a beautiful display of sweets that perfectly complements their wedding venue, personal style and vision. Final design meetings with my couples is one of my favorite parts of each project – sharing ideas with each other and coming up with something beautifully unique for them. The best thing I can hear is “I trust you with the design and want you to just do your thing”. That’s when I do my best work!
When wedding season slows down (usually around late November until early April) I send my focus to decorated sugar cookies for the holidays – Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentines Day, Easter & Mother’s Day. For each holiday, I create beautifully designed cookie sets & gift boxes. They make perfect gifts for anyone you’d like to share some love with! 😉
I thoroughly enjoy what I do and I believe that if you love what you do, that joy overflows into your work 🙂
Every event and every client is different, but the end result always has the same goal – the perfect wedding cake and/or cookie set that will put a smile on everyone’s face (and taste buds) 🙂
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
1) Boundaries – It’s taken me years of working hard on this one, and will always have room for improvement but I think it’s super important. In my early years of working for others, I was often taken advantage of as a hard worker – a people pleaser and “yes girl”. While I prioritized being a team player and always giving my best for each project, it often lead to stress, overwhelm and burnout. Once I started working for myself, I realized that I had to hold myself accountable to set healthier boundaries between work and personal life balance. I don’t have to say “yes” to every project. Saying “no” is actually freeing up that time for a better fit, a better “yes”! (Or a rare weekend off, which in this industry is a gift!)
2) Finding your “people” – Your spouse & your family/friends will always be there for you as support – but I’ve found that also having a work family of friends who know your industry and can relate to your journey like others can’t is vital to the support system. I met my one of my absolute best friends at a bridal open house (that turned out to be a huge bust; more vendors than actual engaged couples) – but the silver lining of that situation was that I then had the opportunity to meet another small business owner and we really hit it off! We’ve now been the best of friends for almost 10 years and I cannot imagine life without that relationship. In addition to her, I’ve built relationships with many wedding planners, venue coordinators, florists and other cake designers in my local area. They are an incredible resource for not just booking clients who match our own personal styles, but they have also become good friends who can relate to the demands of the events industry. We support each other – celebrate each of our couples’ marriages and bring wedding day visions to life together – but also make time for coffee dates to talk about our mental health and the struggles of running a small business in the events industry.
3) Investing in yourself to find your own personal style & strengths – I’ve found myself in design ruts before; clients sending the same “inspiration” photos we’ve all seen over and over on Pinterest and feeling frustrated that no one was giving me the opportunity to design something original or creative. Over time I realized that if I wanted to attract clients who would give me creative freedom, I had to create my own gallery of work that showed my skill set, range and personal style to not only show them what I can offer, but trust in my process and artistry. In addition to investing in courses to learn specific techniques, one of the more fun ways of doing this was through accepting a few “styled shoots” each year, where a group of vendors work together to create beautiful images that mutually benefit each member of the team. With each shoot, I would try out a new technique or style I’d been wanting to experiment with – to show a new range of design details I could incorporate into someone else’s wedding cake. Now, instead of asking clients to send me photos from Pinterest, I can ask them to look at my own gallery of work to use as a reference to see what sort of styles inspire them! You attract what you put out, so investing in yourself to put forth your best work to represent your brand and personal style is always going to be beneficial to that journey!
Is there a particular challenge you are currently facing?
One challenge I am constantly facing is trying to juggle all the different “hats” a small business owner has to wear. I have to grocery shop and make sure I keep my inventory of supplies stocked, answer emails and phone calls, meet with each couple to completely customize their order (wedding cake flavors, design details, vendor team collaborations, etc.), fulfill cookie and wedding cake orders and deliveries, wash what feels like a million dishes each week, keep my kitchen clean and organized, stay on top of my social media posting/interacting – the list goes on!
Of all these tasks, I’d say one of the most challenging parts is probably the social media management aspect. It can be one of the most fun parts – posting beautiful photos I receive from the wedding photographers or sharing a set of sugar cookies I loved creating and interacting with my community- but it’s also difficult to find the time to create posts and come up with captions that provoke my followers to interact. The algorithm and changing trends in posting (whether it be reels, videos, etc.) can be overwhelming and sometimes takes the fun out of it.
For the upcoming year, I am going to try and create more consistent and achievable goals for posting. I’d like to set a schedule for what I’ll post on what day of the week, and feel less pressure to post every day. I want to be better about behind the scenes and less “curated” pictures and videos in my “stories” as well. If I can get my community to follow along and interact more in my day to day, I believe having actual posts for my feed will become less daunting. It’s a continuous learning process, but I highly value social media and how it is beneficial especially for a small business so I’m always challenging myself to get better at it.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://ksweetdesigns.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/k_sweetdesigns/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KyrstensSweetDesigns
Image Credits
1st Photo: Elizabeth Mae Photography, The Willows at Ashcombe Mansion
2nd Photo: Garnet Dahlia Photography, Wild Indigo Floral Designs
3rd Photo: Aly V Photography, Orange and Olive (Florist), The Willows at Ashcombe Mansion
4th Photo: Hazelwood Weddings, Loca Flora Design
5th Photo: Alyssa Bunton Photography, Sarah’s Floral Designs
6th Photo: Lauren Bliss Photography, Florals by Adena
8th Photo: Chloe Page Photography, The Willows at Ashcombe Mansion
so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
