A Testimony of Failure

This story is an account of how Pent Hall Week went for me and my home bakery Lucia. 195 days into fully starting and committing to a business and every single day feels like day 1–I’m still very green in this.

It’s taken me 3 full weeks to write this. I talk about the reasons for this in the latter part of this writing.

Planning

Working on stand

The sunny days have been crazy these past months. Monday morning, the 10th of June, was one of those days. Shavliel calls and has news about a popup. “Pent Hall Week is coming up and we’re getting stands. Would you like to take up a stand with me?” They already had a group of four, and adding me would make it five people. “Cool, why not?” I agree, even though my pockets were light. What do I do? I empty all wallets and coin jars and pay for the stand. Zero cedis left.

The main focus was on planning the stand since that’s what would attract people. I wanted passersby to stop and think, Oh look, that’s attractive. Let’s check it out. I’d been to this event twice before and noticed how crowded it gets, yet how little effort goes towards brand activation1.

I decide to go all out with the design—the goal is so impressive you could spot it from a satellite image. I spend countless hours designing and looking for inspiration. Keep in mind, this event is just in two weeks. Every day counts.

Whenever I would confer with friends, I would get questions in the vein of “How many people are you looking to sell to?” How people figured out that metric was beyond me. I need to set a target but how does that work when there’s no analytics on the open internet? I have no idea how many people there are, actively looking to buy from a bakery they just found2.

I make a somewhat blind roll of dice and settle on 300 rolls as my target. I run out of money, again

[This is where Diana reaches out to me to ask how things are going. Upon telling her my grievances, she sends me funds to help out. Love my best friend!]

Procuring ingredients

Without prioritizing, my first thought pushes me to get an “3D” signage. Then buying ingredients. Quite silly of me but the fool isn’t aware of his folly.

Ingredient prices are kicking me in the gut. The showcase maker was taking his very sweet time to respond to my requests. Wood seller unreachable. Signage company moved delivery date forward, ultimately delivering poor work. What is happening? Looks like I’m not getting the stand design I planned on.

The plan with logistics is to camp and prep and Madina, then move to Legon to assemble and bake. A neat idea.

It wasn’t ideal for what I was selling, but it was better than having nothing.

I borrowed a metal table, the showcase, Pyrex bowls and trays, spatulas, and other equipment. For the design, I now had the LED signage, the showcase, and the table.

I also bought an oven and gas cylinder from Jessica , and got the rest of the equipment from Shavliel .

Wednesday, Day 0

Trip to Accra from Koforidua

We head back from Koforidua, making a pit stop at Jessica ‘s to pick up the oven before going to Legon to check out the venue.

“Ah yo come see some kebab people dey fool plus we” is the sentence I’m greeted with as we arrive to check the setup. Turns out a different vendor had taken one of the three spots we paid for. With childish reluctance, they refused to let up. It turned into a big dispute, but we eventually had to settle for just two stands instead of three. They refunded us for the lost spot, and we had to make do with the limited space.

Bubba and his team came in and transformed the place completely. They designed and set everything up beautifully—without their effort, the place would have looked quite basic. As a first-timer in the space, I wanted to learn from Shavliel and Bubba ‘s extensive experience, so naturally, I said less and listened more.

What my cute little setup looked like from the roadside

Thursday, Day 1

Getting everything together

Thursday 2 PM, we start getting everything together. I had to make a two-hour journey from Madina to my house and back to get my stuff and rent a mixer. I get back to Madina, and realize I hadn’t bought butter and other ingredients—and I was out of money, again.

I hadn’t managed my funds well. Rookie mistake. Agatha to the rescue. (To Agatha , I’m aware I still owe you a Lamborghini😄).Got what I needed and started prepping.

Being new to physical presence, I struggled with prioritizing tasks. Depending on Shavliel wasn’t possible since he was busy with his own prep and couldn’t handhold me. Making rolls takes at least two hours of prep time, and I still didn’t have all my ingredients. Already quite behind schedule, I order my stuff from the Max Mart website. Huge mistake.

An hour goes by. No feedback.

2 hours go by. No feedback

3 hours go by. No feedback

It’s 7 PM now. Shavliel has left to Legon without me. No response from Max Mart. No one around me to help. Goosebumps all over. Thankfully, Jessica comes over and we make the store run ourselves. (To hell with max mart delivery). Butter acquired

We get back and it’s 8pm. We prep quickly and head out. We arrive at 10PM—five hours later than I’d promised everyone. Arriving that late means having to figure out where to place my little setup when everyone had already set up.

I figure that out eventually with sweat constantly on my brows. I leave the filling for Lois to handle while I tackle everything else. Prep is fully done. Now to bake–finally.

What’s this? The oven isn’t working. Kill me now haha. Everyone around tries a fix but to no avail. Another hour passes and we’re stuck here. Jessica comes back to the stand and asks if we turned the knob at the bottom. “What knob?” we all wonder. The oven had a tiny knob which we all seemed to miss. All that stressing and the answer was right there. Anxiety might just kill me here before I actually die.

We’re done baking and guess the time? 1AM. Ha!

Someone from Bubba ‘s crew bought a roll and mentioned it was too sweet3—she was right. I sold 2 more and got the same feedback. Everything went into the freezer. Lois did her best but it was up to me to supervise, which I was too busy to do. My fault entirely.

The day ends and we sell 5 rolls in total. All of which I wasn’t happy selling to people because of the sugar content.

Completely and utterly drained in every sense of the word would not do well enough to describe how I was feeling. Enough for a random guy to see me and tell me to go sleep because the stress was so evident. I had to constantly remind myself it wasn’t a bad life—just a challenging day. Regardless I sit with my team to recount how things went and how we plan for Day 2. It was a valuable learning experience. All things calm, knowing we’d try again harder tomorrow.

Friday, Day 2

Friday morning and I jump out of the bed like I’m possessed. A new day to do my best. I prep earlier, while managing graphic design, handling phone calls, engaging on social media, taking pictures to post later, picking up deliveries and a handful of tasks that made me look like the Buddha because I still don’t know how I got all that done with just 2 hands.

Prep is done and it’s time to head out for a store run.

We needed stuff for toppings. A friend offers to pick up the stuff for us so I head out with Shavliel to Legon to meet my wonderful team. An hour and a half and my team is getting agitated because there was no word from this friend about the progress of the shopping The previous day hadn’t gone well, and the goal is to do better today. We can’t have things moving so slowly. Setornam Nyame and I decide to make the store run for filling ingredients ourselves.

Lois , who learns surprisingly quick, laid everything out for me nicely, learning from the previous day. Jumped right into action as soon as I got to the station. Working at full speed, we prepared the filling, assembled everything masterchef-style, and got it all in the oven. Once it was done, we put everything in the showcase and started selling.

That’s when I really noticed how small our stand was. From the middle of the street, it looked like just a condiment station for the cocktail stand because I had set up right next to Shavliel . I wanted to be close to him since it was my event, but that wasn’t the best decision 4 I should have been at the other end.

My small stand looked like an add-on next to his tall, prominent setup. It made selling challenging—It took a lot of explaining to customers. Looking at it from their perspective, I understand their hesitation. How could such a small setup, that resembles a fried yam stand, produce what I was describing?

Despite this, we managed to attract customers—thank God for beautiful women! The feedback on the pastries was incredible.

We sold out completely. Most buyers weren’t even friends or people we knew. Truly wonderful.

Couple buys thrice

One couple came back three times! The girl even bought extra to save for the next day, since she wouldn’t be able to make it. That meant everything to me. Running a home bakery, I rarely get to see people’s reactions to my goods, so witnessing their enjoyment firsthand was straight dopamine.

Saturday, Day 3

I wake up bright-eyed, but exhaustion weighs on me like a boulder. The lack of sleep caught up to me. A splitting headache too strong for five painkillers to do anything about, but steady grind nonetheless. You would expect prep to go perfectly after how things went the day before. Sike! The mixer overheated and started slow cooking the dough while I was tending to graphic design. I was losing my mind but had to continue. I scraped it out, switched bowls, and tried again with a new batch.

The second batch wasn’t looking good either. I was feeling defeated. I pull out my phone to check on things and there’s a notification from Snapchat. A friend who’s also someone I look up to replied to my story. Yay let’s check out what he’s saying.

Oversabi king kong

It was at the point that the word ‘flabbergasted’ made sense to me, because that’s exactly how I was feeling. I thought it was quite evident that I’m new to this and trying my possible best. The kind of situation that leaves your stomach in a twist5. What do I even say to this? I try to not think of the comment but it keeps coming up like a bad poop flush. I have to do the work regardless.

Jessica called to check in. “Sena you don’t sound okay”. “Nothing feels okay right now” I told her. I switched the brand of yeast and this new one was too strong. She tried to calm me down, saying everything would be fine, but I was having trouble taking it in. I kept going anyway, running on an empty tank.

I finally finished at 4 PM but faced delays from every direction. Flyers were late. When they came they were badly printed. Setornam Nyame picks me up and we make our last store run. Pro tip: A P Club card is really handy for shopping at Palace. Saved a grip

Being with Setornam Nyame really helped calm my nerves and forget the world that seemed to be burning. She’s a budding engineer, and talking about things completely unrelated to baking, like her software studies, was a welcome distraction. When we got back, my wonderful team had prepped the table for me. Everyone knew the routine by now. I put on my gloves and get straight to work.

With my team handling coordination, direction and all else, I’m left with the freedom to focus on my work and give it my full focus. I place the last roll on the pan for that batch and turn around to take a breather and that’s Eugene Debrah and Ayivi! We’re talking and here comes Joel Anaman . Emmanuel joins as well and it’s a whole party with the Mande team! That was such a pleasant surprise. The support was wonderful and the feedback even more!

The first batch sold out and it wasn’t even out of the oven yet! The energy was incredible—I had goosebumps! The Mande team was feasting, and other people at the bar kept asking what was happening. When we explained we were baking sweet rolls—orange, blueberry and cinnamon flavors—they wanted to try them too. Of course they came for second servings. I have a great product. All the feedback was positive.

There was this customer, Doris (if you’re reading this, please reach out!), who ordered two rolls. I accidentally gave her different flavors than she ordered—one cinnamon-caramel and one orange-pineapple. When she came over to ask about the filling, my heart stopped. “What flavor is this? It tastes different.” In my mind, different meant bad. Turned out she just wanted to know what it was because she loved the taste! Crisis averted.

Everything was gravy until we hit a snag—we ran out of packaging boxes and brown sugar filling. It was chaos! We needed to get supplies from Alice Mills ‘s place, so I need to make a decision, quickly.

I had a friend nearby who could help. I asked if he could drive to Alice Mills to pick up some supplies and drop them off. He agreed, so they headed out while we periodically checked on them.

“Bro, where are you?” He said he was on his way.

When he finally arrived more than an hour later, I thanked him for the help and went on with my work. I go to pick up the supplies he brought and I can’t find them. I now realize I didn’t ask him where he placed them. It must be somewhere around here. We checked but found nothing.

I called everyone asking about the supplies. No one could find them. Apparently, he mentioned giving them to someone else. We were confused—who did he give them to?

I tried calling him, but he wasn’t picking up. I was losing it.

I searched everywhere—the fridge, freezer, behind the oven, inside the oven, on top of the oven. Not a single spot went unchecked.

What the hell is happening? I was so frustrated I just stopped looking. Sales came to a total halt because of this.

Two hours pass and Alice Mills shows up with everything we’d been looking for. “How do you have the supplies?” I asked.

“He never came to my place,” she said. I was shocked. Better to focus on the task at hand than dwell on that.

Alice Mills brought everything, except the flyers I needed. At this point I’ve built tolerance for uncertainty. We just had to go with it.

As a workaround, we had to show the flyers on our phones, which wasn’t ideal since it was already late. Jessica had a better idea though–use the product as the ad. Wonderful

We huddle and decide on one final push to share the flyers and see what sales we could get. We had some customers come in and buy stuff, but not as many as expected since so much time was wasted. Jessica was incredibly helpful through all this, keeping everything calm and organized, which I really appreciated.

In the end, we managed to get some sales in.

I had to stick around afterward since I was part of the organizing team. We needed to count sales and pack everything up. By morning, everyone had finished packing.

After Pent

Same lady from Bubba ‘s team bought a cinnamon roll the first day ordered for two.

I set it aside and decided to heat it up for her since she’d missed breakfast. “Some morning baking?” is the what I’m asked as I turn on the oven to heat up her rolls. It hadn’t occurred to me to bake for the everyone but they started a chant so I figured what the hell I might as well.

I took out the unbaked rolls from the freezer, put them in the oven to warm up, and baked them for the whole team. It took longer since they were frozen, but good people have patience for good things.

Everyone was so positive and uplifting when I was feeling defeated. That being my first time selling in person, I more than appreciated the support. I learned a whole lot from watching Bubba manage his team—they stayed so coordinated and calm while I was running around losing my head unnecessarily. Of course I received positive feedback from everyone who tasted the rolls. Bubba joked that I should leave my oven open so he could sleep in it. More testimonials and encouragement from the team.

Panic!

I place the last tray into the oven to bake and I finally sit down to watch it bake. After a while my vision gets blurry. My heart rate highly elevated. My fingers tingling and my arms shaking. I feel an emotion I can’t identify wash over me heavily as if being drenched in it. What is happening to me?! Hello Panic Attack. There was nothing I could do but find a space to isolate myself and deal with it. Thankfully Shavliel was around to support me through it.

When I speak of panic attacks I always get the question “What triggered it?” There is no one thing that causes this to happen. One of the main reasons it’s scary is that the feeling you get can’t be identified. It’s hazy and heavy. No it’s not fear. No it’s not anxiety. Something I don’t know

Talking about this took a whole lot of willpower because of the connotation that comes with things like this. I’ve never been one to pass out or anything of the sort. Having this happen is quite new to me and I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it the first time it happened. Strength came from understanding that having panic attacks does not mean I am insufficient in any way. If anything, I’m grateful for having these. I am chasing something that’s big enough to induce panic. To know greats like Steve Jobs, Marcus Aurelius, Drake and Dave had their own internal battles fills me with reassurance and calm. I never considered I would be the one speaking from the point and you might not either–until you are

Cleanup

I pack up what I can then headed to Alice Mills ‘s for a nap. Upon waking, I clean up and go back to get the oven. I see the oven. But where’s the gas cylinder? Please tell me it’s right in front of me and I just can’t see it. I searched frantically, asking every living soul in the area if they had seen it.

I speak to a kenkey seller who was packing up. She urges me to file a complaint, so I did. Turned out security had taken it in for safekeeping. Crisis averted

Why call this a Testimony of Failure?

After all was said and done, I realized that I had failed myself and more importantly, God. I went in with the intention of making a certain amount of money, yet failed to prepare myself to receive this. Running out of packaging boxes goes to show that I simply did not believe that I would sell that quantity. Man has always proven to fall short of the Lord’s glory and this was a personal experience on that.

Raymond pushing me to speak to people was something I didn’t realize at the time was a push to evangelize my product. I failed at being bold

I failed my team by not fully believing in what we were putting out. It is the role of the leader to give direction, and thinking I had to manage every single operation was an ignorant misconception.

Was the entire effort a failure? Far from it

Lessons

Trust in myself, my vision and product more

All in all, there were so many unexpected situations I had to leave out to keep this story somewhat brief. But it was an incredible learning experience. While I didn’t make as much money as I hoped or needed, I gained valuable knowledge. I now understand the importance of coordination in a way I never did before.

Trust in my team more

The biggest lesson was that I should have trusted my team more. I should have given clearer directions and stepped back instead of trying to control every little thing. Watching Bubba work taught me that—it was truly a valuable learning experience.

Clarity through motion

You can sit at the rafters and plan all the possible outcomes you can come up with but the wind blows differently on the field. Everything is a lesson

It’s a performance through and through

The key lessons were about prioritizing tasks and trusting my team—skills I’m still developing. That’s the story. I’ll tag everyone else later, but that’s what happened.

I had to borrow money just to participate. I talk to a friend about it. “Hey, this event is happening and I’d like to be part of it. Could you lend me some money?” They agreed, so I paid for the stand. At this point, I had zero cedis left.

Credits

I can’t possibly write out everything I would like to thank everyone for, or else it would be a separate post, so forgive me for just listing out the names.

Jessica: If it wasn’t for this wonderful woman I wouldn’t gone completely insane at least 10 times during this whole adventure. Thank you for being the wonderful person you are

Diana: Thank you so much for not giving me a hard time and giving me blind support in the way that you did. You’re the kind of great friend books are written about.

Lois: You learn surprisingly quick. You speak softly and act with urgency. You are a wonderful addition to any team you find yourself in and I am proud to have you as a friend.

Setornam & Maame: You girls took time out of your rather busy schedule to help out whatever way you could and that meant the world to me. Thank you.

Joel: Thank you for bringing the Mande team together to support in the way you did. To know you have a family to support your endeavors is a beautiful thing.

Eugene & Agatha: Thank you for keeping my expectations in check when I was planning

Casprine: You know what you did. Thank you❤️.

Houda: Thank you for being a total sweetheart about borrowing your equipment. It was a godsend.

Edith: A lot of the initial ideas and planning for logistics, service and prep before the event were from you. Business advice worth it’s weight in gold.

Shavliel & Alice: Shoutout to the business couple of the year for helping me manage my overthinking.