By Rayne Deese
Smallcakes in Statesboro is a bakery shop that has been here for over ten years. The shop sells cupcakes, cakes, macaroons, and frozen yogurt.
Smallcakes store manager, Olivia Finazzo, walks in to begin her afternoon shift. Olivia has been working there for about a month.
Before Olivia begins her shift, she has to clock in through an online schedule. Without clocking in, Olivia would not get the correct amount of hours needed.
Olivia expresses a giggle as she puts on some plastic gloves. Gloves are required for all employees when they are baking.
Before Olivia begins to decorate, she takes a look at the weekly flavors. Each week, some flavors will stay but many flavors will be rotated out.
Olivia begins icing a cupcake so that it can be put on display. This white icing is made of powder sugar, sugar, and cream cheese.
Olivia continues to ice the cupcake. This cupcake requires two different types of icing since it is called, "The Cheesecake Cupcake."
Olivia adds a jelly filling to the top of the cupcake. This jelly helps give the cupcake a "New York Style" taste to it.
To finish off the cheesecake flavored cupcake, Olivia adds a sprinkle of graham cracker crumbles on top. The crumbles help give the cupcake the cheesecake crust factor.
The beginning process of the cupcakes that Olivia began decorating. As part of her job, Olivia has to decorate more than 100 cupcakes per shift.
As part of her job, Olivia has a list of different cupcakes she has to decorate before allowing customers to enter. In total, there are about three specialty cupcake flavors of the week that require prepping.
Olivia begins icing these small cupcakes by putting a heart on the center of them. These cupcakes are "Pup-cakes," since they are for pets and are made completely out of animal-friendly ingredients.
To finish off the Pup-cakes, Olivia adds a small dog treat in the center of the heart. Smallcakes just now added these to their menu this year.
Once Olivia finished decorating the Pup-cakes, she places them out on display for customers. There is a label in front of these cupcakes that shows customers that they are for animals.
A few cupcakes that Olivia had just finished decorating. These two flavors are the stores most popular cupcakes.
Once all of the cupcakes are decorated, Olivia will then put them out for display. As customers begin to buy cupcakes, she will refill them with more throughout her work shift.
As customers enter into the store, Olivia greets them with a kind greeting. The afternoon shifts tend to be the busiest around five to seven.
Throughout her work shift, Olivia restocks the macarons in their correct section. The strawberry flavored macarons tend to be the best seller compared to the other flavors.
Olivia restocks the fridge with more cheesecakes since customers had been buying them left and right. "Our cheesecakes are some of our best sellers and are almost always low in stock," Olivia said.
Olivia ends her shift by cleaning the dishes. There are usually always a good amount of dishes to be cleaned since most of her job requires a lot of appliances.
