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closeThe queen of indulgent cupcakes
Jen Quaschnik moves her shop to Sumner and vows to make her store more family-friendly, one frosted cupcake at a time
By Avani Nadkarni/of The Herald
When Jen Quaschnik opened up Indulge Cupcakes in downtown Puyallup in December of 2007, she was a first-time business owner who, by her own account, didn’t really know what she was getting into.
By mid-October of this year, when she relocated the cupcake cafe to Sumner, she had turned into an old pro.
“It’s been gratifying, it’s been fabulous,” Quaschnik said as she perched on a plush brown couch in the store’s new Main Street location. “We’re learning to adjust to a new place and a new (customer) schedule.”
“I liked to decorate cakes but it took too long to do a whole cake,” Quaschnik said. “Cupcakes are great because you still get to bake but you only have to frost the top and people can just come in and get one.”
Quaschnik, who owns the business with husband, Darrin, said she learned a lot during the year and a half she spent at the Puyallup location in Meridian Street. Now that she’s in Sumner, where her children attend school, she feels right at home. People drive by the busy intersection where Indulge is now located and spontaneously stop in or simply wave and honk as they pass.
“The other day right after school let out, this whole space was full of schoolkids,” Jones said, gesturing around the cozy store, which is decorated around a fireplace. “They were hanging out, drinking coffee and having fun. That’s what Jen’s always wanted.”
Quaschnik said she made sure Indulge’s decor matched that homey feeling: In addition to the couch and the fireplace, she has a soft brown rug in the middle of the seating area and humorous sayings — such as “Life’s short, eat dessert first,” or “Keep Calm, Have a Cupcake” — are hung up around the store.
Business is thriving in Sumner, too. While she had more pre-orders at the Puyallup location, Quaschnik said more people drop in to try one or two cupcakes in Sumner. As she’s gained customers, they are beginning to order in batches for special events. Recently, Indulge made 750 cupcakes for Pacific Medical Centers employees, each with the company’s logo imprinted on the top. Quaschnik recently invested in a printer that prints edible ink and said she loves personalizing cupcakes.
The personal touch, after all, is part of Indulge’s philosophy. Intimidated by “fancy” bakeries, Quaschnik said she prefers to keep her desserts fresh and delicious, but simple.
“(When we first opened), I felt pressure to have high-end chocolate, organic ingredients,” she explained. “(But) I’d rather be me. I wanted anyone to be able to come in and order and be able to pronounce the names.”
The cupcake names, like Granny’s Chocolate — named for Quaschnik’s great-great-grandmother’s special recipe — and Orange Dreamsicle, aren’t pretentious, Jones said, and customers enjoy ordering them. She has seasonal flavors, like Pumpkin Spice and Gingerbread, which are popular with customers. In fact, Indulge employees are so customer-friendly, Jones said, that they take suggestions for future flavor ideas from people who come into the store.
“One day someone said ‘You should have orange cupcakes’ and the next day Jen walked in with a bag of oranges,” Jones said.
Similarly, the Caramel Machiatto cupcake came from a 19-year-old coffee buff who inspired Quaschnik to whip up the flavor.
It’s easy to treat customers like family, the ladies said, when the employees are so close-knit. Quaschnik has 16 employees, who work around each other’s busy extracurricular schedules, which she encourages. Indulge has low employee turnover and Quaschnik was touched when all of her employees, many of them students, went for one month without a job while she got her Sumner store up and running, waiting patiently to start work again when she re-opened.
“We are one big, dysfunctional family,” she joked. “(The employees) love each other and they have a phenomenal working relationship.”