Pound Bizness – Nicole Felix Borders

#021 – Today we talk with Oakland native, resident and entrepreneur Nicole Felix Borders of Pound Bizness. Pound Bizness is literally a labor of love. Nicole’s husband Reggie made 4 pound cakes from a family recipe for Nicole’s mom to take to the church fish fry. When she came home with a dozen orders Nicole said…

“how you got us a dozen orders when we’re not even a business.”

More and more people were requesting their cakes and Pound Bizness was on the verge of a number of corporate opportunities before the pandemic brought everything to a halt. There were several moments where they thought they were done, but didn’t realize they were just beginning because what happened next was epic!

Dave Clark from KTVU Channel 2 News posted on social media that he was looking for a recommendation for a brick and mortar shop to purchase a pound cake. People replied with “try Pound Bizness”. Nicole’s mom told her to ignore the brick and mortar part and send Dave a cake. So, she did – she sent a cake to Dave at the KTVU station AND Dave posted it on his page…..

“slowly slicing into it and enticing his followers. And everybody just had to have what Dave Clark had. And so we had customers from Oakland to Discovery Bay to Fairfield and everything. And that just really opened up a new channel for us.”

Everyone thinks Nicole is the baker, but Reggie actually brought the recipe via his Aunt Ira – Nicole added the flavor. They relish in demystifying the assumptions around traditional roles. Pound Bizness has grown to 13 different cake flavors which mostly come from customer suggestions. You can find their cakes at local farmers markets and on their website.

Be sure to stick around until the end to hear how the “love ingredient” makes it all work.