Steven Devine | Crumbs
Victoria Hart | Crumbs
First, be a morning person or learn how to act like one.
Kris Wallace, owner of Buy the Dozen Donuts, unlocks her shop and turns on her Lil’ Orbits mini doughnut maker at 4:30 a.m. five days a week.
Which leads to No. 2: Get the support of your family.
Wallace, a mother of four children under the age of 10, said she is grateful for a supportive husband and helpful mother. On weekday mornings when Wallace is at the shop, her husband readies their children for school.
“He’s always done the cooking,” she said. “I don’t know how to cook.”
“That’s because I never cooked,” said Sally, her mother who moved to Moscow from New Jersey five years ago at Wallace’s urging.
The two women have matching straight, silver hair cut short around their ears. Sally wears glasses and monitors their iPhones while her daughter stirs pinkish frosting.
“It just won’t thicken up,” Wallace said.
“Try adding more blueberries,” Sally offered.
This morning she’s working on blueberry French toast, a new creation with crunchy coating, blueberry frosting and graham cracker crumbs. The complicated combination is far from her most adventurous flavors.
And that’s the third tip: Get creative — every doughnut shop these days has a gimmick.
Wallace said her unusual menu has been compared to Voodoo or Psycho doughnuts, and keeps customers wanting more. Unlike those bakeries, though, Wallace’s menu changes daily.
“I don’t decide what I’m making until I get here in the morning,” Wallace said.
She strolls the aisles of the WINCO bulk foods section and reads Ben & Jerry’s ice cream labels for inspiration.
“I’ve learned along the way what works and what doesn’t,” she said.
Even flavors Wallace doubts usually find a customer. She talked about making a pepper jelly glaze she was unsure about, and selling a whole tray to the first man who tried one. Flavors that seem unusual, such as lemon basil, often get resistance from less adventurous eaters.
“Then I make them try it,” Sally said.
Sally serves as taste-tester, and likes almost every flavor Wallace harbors doubts about.
“She’s a perfectionist,” Sally said.
As her daughter heads back to the kitchen for more blueberries and powdered sugar, Sally checks the store’s Facebook from her iPhone for photo comments and “Likes.”
“I just hang out,” she said. “I’ve been here from the beginning.”
The beginning was four years ago when Wallace bought the doughnut machine used on eBay and applied for a stall at the Moscow Farmers Market. After reviewing her product, officials refused her membership because she makes the batter with a store-bought mix.
Wallace set up a tent just outside the market’s territory and the scent of freshly fried doughnuts lured shoppers to her unsanctioned stall.
“In four years I never missed a market,” Wallace said.
And her clientele grew with every Saturday until she had a constant line and struggled to keep up with demand. She served warm, sugared doughnuts in crisp paper bags to adults and children alike. The spectacle of the process also drew market-goers.
“Kids and guys love watching the machine,” Wallace said.
At almost 40 inches long, more than a foot wide and 2 feet tall, it’s no wonder the stainless steel doughnut maker is fascinating.
“Everyone who sees the machine wants one,” Sally said.
Brand new models sell for about $6,000, but Wallace bought a used machine on eBay. Since she purchased it, the built-in counter has registered the production of about 860,000 mini doughnuts.
She returns from the kitchen with a plastic tub of blueberries, and smashes a few with her mixing spoon before re-thinking the idea.
“Maybe I’ll just put a blueberry in the middle,” she mused.
Sally nodded approvingly.
“That guy thought the espresso beans were blueberries,” Sally said. “I bet that’d be cute.”
Wallace pulls a bin of doughnuts, cooled from earlier that morning and ready for frosting, from under the counter and begins dipping the tops.
“I turn the machine on right away,” Wallace said of her morning routine. “It takes at least half an hour for the oil to get hot.”
Then she mixes batter, which also has to rest, then makes her first batches of the day — maple bacon and mocha — to be ready at 6:30 when she opens.
A plunger pushes rings of batter out of the hopper into a canal of hot grease. The dough floats down the track and puffs up, flipped by automated trays, and drop gently into the receiving bin. Then Wallace lets them cool to frost later, or tosses warm doughnuts in one of her custom sugars.
“I try not to repeat flavors too often,” Wallace said.
Some returning customers long for a more predictable fair, but Wallace said she enjoys experimenting. One of her favorite recipes is tequila lime with salt. She said a woman came in and tried one, then bought the whole tray.
“They’re really good,” Sally said. “That’s fun — being small — that you can try whatever you want.”
Wallace makes sure customers benefit from her flexibility, too. She offers to create custom combinations and deals on the spot.
“There are no rules, I can mix up boxes and flavors — whatever they want,” she said.
Wallace talked about a married couple that comes in on Sundays and orders their donuts in separate boxes so her coffee donuts don’t touch his selections.
So that’s tip No. 4: Be flexible with your product and process. Take customer input and customize the experience.
Before the frosting sets, Wallace adds a dusting of graham cracker crumbs and a fresh blueberry to each. She adds the finished tray to her pastry case, and then checks her iPhone.
“Facebook has been all the right factors,” Wallace said, scrolling through Buy the Dozen’s active page.
She posts photos every morning and lists the flavors available. A few special promotions were successful and the page’s “Likes” shot up, but she credits word-of-mouth with her recent customer jump.
Which is No. 5: Use social media wisely, but don’t forget about old-fashioned marketing.
“About half the people that come in every day haven’t been in before,” Wallace said.
Their new T-shirts might increase sales, too.
The beige shirts feature the same design and logo as Buy the Dozen’s Facebook photo and storefront sign, which hangs in the window facing Sixth Street. The shop occupies a cubby between John’s Alley and Nuart Theater.
After the 2012 market season, Wallace began thinking about making the move to year-round business.
“Something changed — I don’t know what — this last year, and I started looking for a permanent spot,” she said.
She heard about the space from a friend, but couldn’t find it until one day when she drove by and the lights were on. Wallace said the shop was move-in ready except for the installation of an exhaust fan. She painted the walls and her ever-supportive husband cut out a piece of countertop for the front desk, and she was ready for business.
Store-bought mix may exclude Wallace from the Farmers Market, but it also exempts her from most health department regulations. She also has it easier because she is her only employee. Sally is quick to point out her position is unpaid.
Simplifying her business also cut many of Wallace’s startup costs dramatically. She guessed that hers is one of the cheapest startups around.
“Right after getting the storefront, I freaked out a little, like, ‘What’d I just do?’” Wallace said.
Most days she is reminded of her love for creating unique flavors, but sometimes she has to deal with negative comments.
“There’ve been one or two unhappy customers,” Wallace said. “At first I was really upset, but I’ve learned I can’t let them bother me.”
“You know, you can’t please everyone all the time,” Sally said.
So that’s No. 6: Practice unflagging positivity.
Small business owners in any industry deal with disappointment, and Wallace said she has learned to accept criticism and move past it.
Buy the Dozen celebrated its three-month anniversary March 1, and Wallace looks forward to its continued growth.