Rosa Dixon had just co-founded a bakery in Arcata. The bakery was a byproduct of her family's food allergies, because "we just weren't able to eat anything that tasted good." But when a one-line email said "Are you interested in selling to Whole Foods?" she was skeptical. A decade later, the bakery's gluten-free products are in over 3000 stores nationwide, and, as Dixon will tell you, it took a village.
In this episode of Talk Humboldt, Keith and Tom talk get the origin story of Natural Decadence bakery.
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Jackson: Hi, I'm Tom Jackson.
Flamer: And I'm Keith Flamer:
Jackson: I'm the President of Cal Poly Humboldt. And my dear friend Keith is the President of College of the Redwoods. And we're in this amazing place. As we walked in, it's really cool and distinctive. We’re with Rosa Dixon of Natural Decadence. Thank you for joining us today.
Dixon: Thank you, guys so much for having me. I'm really excited.
Flamer: Actually, I want to first take a bite out of this pie. But first just let me ask you, how did you even become a chef, and how did that lead into what you're doing now?
Dixon: I was doing catering, high-end wedding cakes. I loved it. I would take all the time and I have three children. Our family is what I call special: we have lots of food restrictions. And when my youngest daughter was about a year old, she got really sick. She was misdiagnosed with cystic fibrosis at a year old. And we were living in and out of the hospital all after six months.
She was just getting sicker and sicker and sicker and sicker. Probably one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. So we were flown down to Stanford and within 24 hours of being there, they diagnosed her with Celiac disease, which there is one and only cure, and that's to remove gluten from your diet.
All of her symptoms went away within the first four months of removing gluten. Within the first year she went from being in the point zero percentile for height and weight to being in the 87th. And now she is 13 years old and and like 5’6 and just so healthy and thriving.
Through the process of really eliminating gluten, we realized all the other things. My whole life I've had a severe peanut allergy. My oldest daughter can't have 13 different foods, including coconut and soy, and it just goes on and on and on.
So we just weren't able to eat anything that tasted good and it was just so hard. [laughter]
I mean, I didn't even know how to cook anymore. It was just it was a whole life-changing experience. And my childhood best friend and my best friend today and business partner, Milia Lando, said, ‘We’ve got to start a bakery. We need to provide high-quality, allergen-friendly foods for our families.’
And we thought it was going to be small. We thought it was going to be two moms, childhood best friends, baking together. And so we launched the chocolate silk pie. Basically, it's a vegan cream pie and it's a gluten-free crust. We were in about, I don't know, the four local stores, you know, the Co-ops, Wildberries, Eureka Natural Foods.
And I got a one-line email that said, when we were about six months old (the business) that said, “Are you interested in selling to Whole Foods?” And that's all it said. And I thought it was spam. So I just replied, 'Of course.'
Flamer: Yeah, that's a good answer.
Dixon: And then I realize there is LinkedIn and I could look up who had sent it to me, and his title was Whole Foods Local Food Forager, and he had come through Humboldt County and he had seen our chocolate pie. So within two weeks of that email, we were down at the regional office pitching to Whole Foods, the whole community pulled behind us for that pitch because we didn't know what to expect or what to do.
And so the SBDC held these mock pitches for us and got us prepared and we launched two months later - and that really started our company. Today we're in about 3500 stores across the country and we have 18 different products.
Flamer: Wow.
Jackson: That's an amazing story.
Flamer:
Well, that's a great story. It really is. Oh, my gosh.
Jackson:I'm loaded with questions, Rosa. You clearly are having some great success. May there be some advice for other business owners like yourself?
Dixon: Number one, you have to have passion for what you do if you're an entrepreneur - because it's going to be ten times the amount of work you expected. It's going to cost ten times the amount of money you thought, but it will be ten times the reward.
And then my second advice is when you're launching a new product, it has to be something different.
We hit the market at the perfect time. I do not think I could launch this product line today because we hold the gluten-free pie across the country. We are the largest gluten-free supplier in the country.
Jackson: Right here in Arcata.
Dixon: Right here in Arcata. Wow. But if we didn't have that space, we didn't have the partnerships we had - someone else would have it. And you don't need more than one gluten-free pie. We we cover it. We're. We're good. I tell my stores that all the time, you don't need anything else.
Flamer: If you were speaking to a group of young females, students say ten years old.
Dixon: Yeah.
Flamer: And they they said, how could I be more like you? What would you say to them?
Dixon: Hmm. That's good, because I have three daughters.
Flamer: There you go.
Dixon: What I would say is, find your power inside and do not be afraid to show it. I'll be a lot of times where I’m the only woman in a room with, you know, an entire sales team of men. And, you know, they will be wanting to talk to themselves. And then I'll sit up and I'll just be like, ‘Nope, that's not what we're doing and let's move on, you know?’ And just, I am unapologetic.
Flamer: Find your power.
Dixon: Find your power and just let it shine.
Jackson: Rosa, I get the sense that Arcata - and Humboldt County - has a way of working together between the businesses in the cooperative sense. Can you share a little bit about that and how that's working for you in this business?
Dixon: Yes, Humboldt County is just incredible and how supportive they are and Humboldt Made has been a huge part of that. The Sbdc has been a huge part of that. We all have worked together to help each other. We travel together, sharing transportation, sharing lodging. I've had just the most amazing mentors, and I like to think that I've mentored other people.
We live in such a remote area and it's so special here behind the redwoods... we just got each other.
Flamer: Thank you. Now it's time to eat.
Jackson: Thank you, Rosa. Thank you very much.
Dixon: Thank you guys so much for having me.
Jackson: Hi, I'm Tom Jackson.
Flamer: And I'm Keith Flamer:
Jackson: I'm the President of Cal Poly Humboldt. And my dear friend Keith is the President of College of the Redwoods. And we're in this amazing place. As we walked in, it's really cool and distinctive. We’re with Rosa Dixon of Natural Decadence. Thank you for joining us today.
Dixon: Thank you, guys so much for having me. I'm really excited.
Flamer: Actually, I want to first take a bite out of this pie. But first just let me ask you, how did you even become a chef, and how did that lead into what you're doing now?
Dixon: I was doing catering, high-end wedding cakes. I loved it. I would take all the time and I have three children. Our family is what I call special: we have lots of food restrictions. And when my youngest daughter was about a year old, she got really sick. She was misdiagnosed with cystic fibrosis at a year old. And we were living in and out of the hospital all after six months.
She was just getting sicker and sicker and sicker and sicker. Probably one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. So we were flown down to Stanford and within 24 hours of being there, they diagnosed her with Celiac disease, which there is one and only cure, and that's to remove gluten from your diet.
All of her symptoms went away within the first four months of removing gluten. Within the first year she went from being in the point zero percentile for height and weight to being in the 87th. And now she is 13 years old and and like 5’6 and just so healthy and thriving.
Through the process of really eliminating gluten, we realized all the other things. My whole life I've had a severe peanut allergy. My oldest daughter can't have 13 different foods, including coconut and soy, and it just goes on and on and on.
So we just weren't able to eat anything that tasted good and it was just so hard. [laughter]
I mean, I didn't even know how to cook anymore. It was just it was a whole life-changing experience. And my childhood best friend and my best friend today and business partner, Milia Lando, said, ‘We’ve got to start a bakery. We need to provide high-quality, allergen-friendly foods for our families.’
And we thought it was going to be small. We thought it was going to be two moms, childhood best friends, baking together. And so we launched the chocolate silk pie. Basically, it's a vegan cream pie and it's a gluten-free crust. We were in about, I don't know, the four local stores, you know, the Co-ops, Wildberries, Eureka Natural Foods.
And I got a one-line email that said, when we were about six months old (the business) that said, “Are you interested in selling to Whole Foods?” And that's all it said. And I thought it was spam. So I just replied, 'Of course.'
Flamer: Yeah, that's a good answer.
Dixon: And then I realize there is LinkedIn and I could look up who had sent it to me, and his title was Whole Foods Local Food Forager, and he had come through Humboldt County and he had seen our chocolate pie. So within two weeks of that email, we were down at the regional office pitching to Whole Foods, the whole community pulled behind us for that pitch because we didn't know what to expect or what to do.
And so the SBDC held these mock pitches for us and got us prepared and we launched two months later - and that really started our company. Today we're in about 3500 stores across the country and we have 18 different products.
Flamer: Wow.
Jackson: That's an amazing story.
Flamer:
Well, that's a great story. It really is. Oh, my gosh.
Jackson:I'm loaded with questions, Rosa. You clearly are having some great success. May there be some advice for other business owners like yourself?
Dixon: Number one, you have to have passion for what you do if you're an entrepreneur - because it's going to be ten times the amount of work you expected. It's going to cost ten times the amount of money you thought, but it will be ten times the reward.
And then my second advice is when you're launching a new product, it has to be something different.
We hit the market at the perfect time. I do not think I could launch this product line today because we hold the gluten-free pie across the country. We are the largest gluten-free supplier in the country.
Jackson: Right here in Arcata.
Dixon: Right here in Arcata. Wow. But if we didn't have that space, we didn't have the partnerships we had - someone else would have it. And you don't need more than one gluten-free pie. We we cover it. We're. We're good. I tell my stores that all the time, you don't need anything else.
Flamer: If you were speaking to a group of young females, students say ten years old.
Dixon: Yeah.
Flamer: And they they said, how could I be more like you? What would you say to them?
Dixon: Hmm. That's good, because I have three daughters.
Flamer: There you go.
Dixon: What I would say is, find your power inside and do not be afraid to show it. I'll be a lot of times where I’m the only woman in a room with, you know, an entire sales team of men. And, you know, they will be wanting to talk to themselves. And then I'll sit up and I'll just be like, ‘Nope, that's not what we're doing and let's move on, you know?’ And just, I am unapologetic.
Flamer: Find your power.
Dixon: Find your power and just let it shine.
Jackson: Rosa, I get the sense that Arcata - and Humboldt County - has a way of working together between the businesses in the cooperative sense. Can you share a little bit about that and how that's working for you in this business?
Dixon: Yes, Humboldt County is just incredible and how supportive they are and Humboldt Made has been a huge part of that. The Sbdc has been a huge part of that. We all have worked together to help each other. We travel together, sharing transportation, sharing lodging. I've had just the most amazing mentors, and I like to think that I've mentored other people.
We live in such a remote area and it's so special here behind the redwoods... we just got each other.
Flamer: Thank you. Now it's time to eat.
Jackson: Thank you, Rosa. Thank you very much.
Dixon: Thank you guys so much for having me.
