The Forrager Podcast for Cottage Food Businesses

The Forrager Podcast for Cottage Food Businesses

Learn how to start a food business from your home kitchen by hearing stories from cottage food entrepreneurs about how they grew their businesses from the ground up. Does everyone ask for your recipes, or say "You should sell that"? Have you dreamed of starting a brick-and-mortar bakery, or simply want a fun hobby that brings in some extra dough? On this podcast, David interviews a wide range of entrepreneurs across America who legally sell their homemade food via their state's cottage food law. Each episode reveals strategies for marketing and selling your food products successfully from home, online, at farmers markets/events, and in stores. Learn what steps you should (or shouldn't) take, and get your cottage food business off to the right start!

Episodes

July 1, 2025 57 mins
Annie Wang of Oakland, CA shares how she turned multiple passions into a very successful hyper-niched and eco-friendly bakery by starting small, scaling up, and completing a massive rebrand

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/144

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Ana Delgado of Wingdale, NY shares her incredible cottage food business journey that includes starting over twice, overcoming a midlife crisis, and dealing with burnout on her unlikely path to success

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/143

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Georgi DeCosta of Kaneohe, HI shares how she used baking to help overcome depression, and turned her baking therapy into a legitimate cottage food business that has given her a new purpose in life

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/142

Mark as Played
May 20, 2025 59 mins
Rita Magalde runs Sheer Ambrosia in Salt Lake City, UT and shares her roller coaster baking business journey of 17 years that includes big risks, life changes, surprises, failures and successes

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/141

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Michelle Chesser of Millersville, MO started her home bakery 16 years ago from humble beginnings and built it into a "monster" that changed her family's life and led her to become an online influencer

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/140

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April 22, 2025 58 mins
Chris Martin of Charlottesville, VA shares how she used her experience working at 3-star Michelin restaurants to build a successful cottage food bakery, and then reinvented it despite its popularity

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/139

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April 8, 2025 59 mins
Davia Delgado of Trenton, NJ has experienced incredibly fast growth in her cottage food bakery, and shares how she achieved many $2k and $3k sales days within her first year of business

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/138

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Elena-Maria Hert of Billings, MT shares how she persisted to create a successful cottage food bakery, despite struggling to acquire customers, source ingredients, and achieve work/life balance

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/137

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Allyson Grant of Baldwin City, KS shares her wild journey from starting a home bakery to growing a chain of cupcake stores, appearing on the Food Network, and coaching cottage food entrepreneurs

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/136

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February 25, 2025 59 mins
Rachel Laukala of Ravensdale, WA shares how she built a very successful cottage food bakery selling only cake pops, amassed over 100k followers on Instagram, and started an online cake pop school

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/135

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February 11, 2025 59 mins
Meggen Wilson of Whitefish, MT shares how she converted her cottage food business into an ecommerce brand, and covers many topics including licensing, branding, copacking, ecommerce, SEO, email & more

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/134

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January 28, 2025 59 mins
Matt Rosen of Eden Prairie, MN shares his unlikely journey from non-baker to bakery owner, including a major rebrand, a fortuitous commercial facility, and a business decision that tripled his sales

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/133

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January 14, 2025 59 mins
Delaney Peters of Wasilla, AK shares how her cottage food bakery became a massive success within its first year, despite having modest business ambitions and also being a stay-at-home mom of an infant

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/132

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December 31, 2024 58 mins
Maci Reed of Dover, NH shares how she rapidly built a successful cottage food bakery by focusing on helping others and fostering community, and eventually sold over 1,000 baked goods in a single day

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/131

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December 17, 2024 53 mins
Denise Golia of North Providence, RI shares how she started a very successful bakery by niching way down, despite being limited by a personal injury and not being able to start from her home kitchen

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/130

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Jondell Lafont-Garcia of Pflugerville, TX is one of the foremost experts in the homemade marshmallow trend and shares how she built her cottage food business despite facing a major personal challenge

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/129

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November 19, 2024 59 mins
Wynter Hosier of Greentown, IN shares how she built her cottage food bakery into a successful storefront by persevering and giving back, despite facing many unexpected twists and turns along the way

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/128

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Joan Eppehimer of Jamestown, NY shares how she raised thousands of dollars for charity with a cottage food business, and (with the help of her nephew Jason) rebranded her business to boost sales

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/127

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Kristi Otto of Fort Myers, FL shares how she leveraged her extensive food industry experience to succeed with her cottage food bakery, despite her community not resonating with her products initially

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/126

Mark as Played
October 8, 2024 59 mins
Nicole DiMarco of West Deptford, NJ shares how she took the leap with a new product, and leveraged her sales, retail, and social media experience to quickly start a successful cottage food business

Get full show notes and transcript here: https://forrager.com/podcast/125

Mark as Played

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