Albany Baker Launches 20,000 Slice Challenge To Open Her Own Shop

ALBANY (WJON News) -- An Albany woman has a goal of buying her own bakery, and she says she's going to make it happen one slice of cake at a time.

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Jada Ewing owns a cottage baking business out of her home called Southern Mama Goodies.

She says when she found out the bakery in Albany was for sale, she decided she wanted to buy it. To come up with the $200,000 needed to buy the business, she has created the 20,000 slice challenge.

It was kind of a random idea. I posted it out there: how about I sell slices of cake for $10  a piece? I'm going to sell 20,000 of them, and I'm going to buy the bakery.  It just blew up in the best way possible.

Ewing says that since she launched the challenge on September 18th, she's gotten a lot of support.

I get 14 slices per cake, and as of last Thursday, I've sold 136 physical slices of cake.

Ewing says you can buy a whole 10-inch cake for $140 if you want. She says you'd likely end up with much more than 10 slices.

She says for people who don't live in central Minnesota, they can also help out with buying virtual slices.

People can click on a link that I have and purchase a slice of cake, essentially.  And when I have enough slices purchased- 14 for one whole cake- I will take that cake, and I will walk into a local business and hand off that cake to schools, nurses, police offices, and random small businesses in town.

Ewing says she does a flavor drop every day at 5:00 p.m. with the next flavor of cake.

Every day at 5:00 p.m., the new flavor drops and those 14 slices are available.  They are first-come, first-served; as soon as they are gone, they are gone, and we move on to the next flavor.

When you buy a slice, you get a private message to coordinate the pickup and payment.

Ewing is a self-taught baker who picked up the hobby in 2020. She has been a full-time hospice CNA, but she just handed in her resignation to dedicate herself full-time to baking.

We have a link to the Southern Mama Goodies Facebook page if you want to see the cake of the day or to buy a slice for yourself.