The Making of a Great Team at Our Bakery Cafe

Perhaps the best thing about our bakery café is our team members. Our first two employees were neighborhood girls, ages 12 and 14, whose duties were to sweep the floors, water the flowers, pour coffee, and warm up an occasional cinnamon roll for the infrequent customers who came in at that time. From those two, who worked year round through their high-school years and then summers through their college years, to the twenty or thirty team members who presently work for us, we have had stellar employees.

The common denominator with the people whom God seems to send our way is that they are typically cheerful, hard working, friendly and fun to be around. Our customers consistently tell us how great our staff is, whether they are in the studio, office, retail store or coffee shop. We even get emails and notes telling us about their warm experiences with our team members! 

There have been a few, very few, lemons -- like the one who seemed to have a magnet attached to her bottom and was constantly sitting down on the metal stool until I thought Marci might pull her hair out. But on the whole, we have been extremely blessed with our co-workers. Our hope is that they gain something beyond a paycheck from us and that we can be a place where they can grow as well.

The sad part about employing younger people who are in a time of transition in their lives, is that they are with us more briefly than we would like and it seems as if we are all too often saying, “goodbye.”

This month we had a send off for Stephanie, who co-managed the kitchen with Marci for the past four years. Stephanie is wanting to make sure she is where God is calling her to be -- and will be spending some time in Africa with her church and with a missionary family there as part of her quest. It is, as with so many others who have left, difficult to say goodbye, but we continue to look forward in hope.

God has always faithfully brought people to fill the positions that are left open, and always gives us an opportunity to trust Him for our needs.

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