Vida Bakery; East London's vegan bakery changing the game

A big change is coming”- Vegan Bakery Owner Discusses How Having A Big Online Following Make Business Boom

 

Vida Bakery has been on Brick Lane since June 2018 but, has been alive and beating for much longer than that. Owners Dani , 29 and Vane, 28  were once two students from South America studying in London who found  a love for baking and had a niche in the market, they applied for a business Visas and the Journey to Brick Lane began.

Vane came to London to study finance Dani said, “She's more like the business side of it. I do on the creative part and on the marketing recipe development and all of that team building all of that and I absolutely love it. And she obviously helps be the accountancy and all the weird stuff and all the extra numbers you have to pay.”

 “We've been running the company for four years mostly doing festivals and events and markets and stuff like that”. What started off as selling cakes for her Uni peers, Dani transformed her passion into a business. “People started ordering them and I was like,  “No sorry we don't do that! I just upload the picture on Instagram for myself.’ Until I was like ‘What the hell!’ And I was selling everything for like £20. I was delivering them anywhere in London.” 

Since the day Vida Bakery opened the seats are never empty. The rainbow cake, Vida’s speciality, files off the cake stand, “We've been very lucky to start doing what we do in Instagram era. Where we have a big following (24.5K followers) , which helps business. And I always say some element of luck, we were just doing what we wanted to do and people seemed to like it a lot. People from all over come to London just for us. People tell us they have flown over for our cake, its crazy but that’s the power of social media.” 

 Brick Lane, the home to quirkiness. Full with vintage clothing stores and ‘trendy’ food joints. Shoreditch is notoriously a ‘hipster’ or quirky place to young people. However, Shoreditch was once Jack the Ripper and Kray Twins terrority. In the last two decades more business have migrated here as it hold great potential.  What was once just Banglatown is now a multicultural and multi-creative street. 

“I knew we couldn't go for Covent Garden. it's impossible to go in there with the budget we had even though our budget was comfortable for a start-up. Everyone was always talking to me about East London. This is the place that historically has welcome immigrants. So, I thought it was cool and diverse, different and colourful. And not cheap but affordable.”

Dani and Vane now owns a vibrant little store on Brick Lane, with veganism growing, attracting more customers than ever. Vegans have a bad name in the media. There are a lot of vast misconceptions. Militant vegans seems to be ones that get the bad press.  “You know some vegans are the hardest people to keep happy. If you have anything with plastic they ask too many questions almost like to take you down and to prove you're not doing your best. Which obviously we are because we care.”. It’s almost impossible to keep everyone happy. 

What happens in a day in the life of a London Bakery? “The Bakers come first. We normally tried to have a tea or coffee together every morning . The girls from the customer service come a little after and open the shop with what we finish baking or decorating and then you never know what the day will bring. You just have to be ready. Good attitude and tried to have a good night's sleep because you literally don't know what the day will look like. I’m lucky really awesome gorgeous people that come here with good energy and very grateful for what we do. So that obviously makes everything worth it.”

 “To be honest. Every time that someone just walks into the door. It's a dream come true. 

That's just the best feeling in the world to see that people not only support your dream they literally made your dream come true. So hopefully we can get to open many more shops in London and perhaps Brighton. I would love to open a shop in Brighton, I used to live there. A big bigfactory I can just see all the hundreds of rainbow cakes a day. So, there's definitely a market to grow vegans are reproducing by day. A big change is coming people are a lot more aware of why they eat and where it comes from. So, I think they will make better choices. So, it's good for everyone the planet the animals humans everyone wins.”

The world is evolving with the Exciton Rebellion protests in Central London, and the International Rebellion happening world-wide. With more and more TV programmes highlighting the crisis we are in with our planet. And amazing teens like Greta Thunberg speaking to Parliaments all across Europe. We are going to see an increase in vegan food, as the market grows. “Vida means life in Spanish. We choose the name because it pretty much reflects our brand and ethos of celebrating life and adding colour to your everyday.”

Vida's instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vidabakery/?hl=en