College Student Bakes 1,500 Cheesecakes to Pay Tuition

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

Introducing the College Confectionista. Long ago, we did a story on a woman who breeds rabbits to pay for college. Now we have a story of a woman who bakes cheesecakes. Personally, I am more excited about cheesecakes than I am about rabbits. But how much money can you actually make selling cheesecakes?

Well, perhaps a better initial question is, how many cheesecakes can you sell? Because, in this story, the College Confectionista sells more than $1,500. At $40 a pop, that adds up to more than $60,000. In fact, she bakes as many as $324,000 in a single week. Welcome to Sadosville School. My name is Chris Guillebeau.

I'm so excited to be able to bring you these stories every single day. This one is called "College Student Bakes 1,500 Cheesecakes to Pay Tuition." It's coming to you in just 30 seconds. Stay tuned. Anna Maria Morales has been a side hustler since she was six years old. When her grandparents spent her birthday money, she would buy cardstock, make greeting cards, and then go selling them door-to-door.

A year later, she went to her town's weekly summer in the Plaza Festivals and offered custom pedicures with rhinestones and painted flowers. Then, at the old age of 12, she started her soggy-doggy dogwashing business and sold dog-friendly popsicles she coined Pupsicles. Her latest hustle has been the most successful of all. It's called College Confectionista. And just as we are working on this story, she appeared on Good Morning America.

No doubt due to our research. Just kidding. It was all her. And this hustle is all about cheesecake. Handcrafted cheesecake, that is.

And so far, she's sold over 1,500 of these handcrafted cheesecakes. It all started four years ago when she made one of those cheesecakes (I guess that would be number one) at home with no business plan in mind. The next day, her mom took some of it to work to share. And a coworker liked it so much, it gave Ana Maria an idea. She said if that coworker or anyone else wanted the cheesecake bad enough, she could be persuaded to bake and sell it to them.

This happened during her senior year of high school when college expenses were weighing heavily on her mind. To avoid accumulating debt, she held off attending a four-year university right away. Instead, she enrolled in a local community college. Her goal was to transfer to a four-year institution only when she had enough money to pay for it. So with that in mind, she wrote a Facebook post that said, "I'm going to be making my New York-style cheesecake for $40 per cake.

All of the proceeds go toward paying my college fund. Message me if you're interested." By the end of the first month, she had an order every single day. Clearly, she hit upon a recipe for success. Ana Maria started working in a friend's commercial kitchen so she could be compliant with local regulations. She also started offering four flavors per week, three seasonal or holiday flavors, plus her Sonoma County style, which is a variation of a basic New York-style recipe with her personal tweaks.

Examples of holiday offerings include Red Velvet and Eggnog at Christmas, Bailey's Irish Cream for St. Patrick's Day, and Salted Caramel Pecan for Thanksgiving. Summer seasonal selections include Peaches and Cream and Blackberry Cobbler. Are you getting hungry over there? Customers order from Facebook, Instagram, text, phone, or email, and they can pick up either her home or the commercial kitchen.

They can pay by cash, credit card, Venmo, or Facebook payment. Lots of options. Practically all of her marketing is organic, unpaid social media as well as exposure on shows like Side Hustle School and, of course, smaller outlets like Good Morning America. Facebook has brought her the most customers by far, and she does all the photography in our work herself, with her cousin lending a hand whenever she herself needs to appear in the photos. A fan of all things retro, 1950s vintage is her signature style.

She sprinkles vintage ads of smiling housewives, which, you know, by the way, that was the style back then, the phrase. I wouldn't use it now. 1950s. But she takes these ads and sprinkles them throughout her social media postings with cheesecakes cleverly photoshopped in it. Now, of course, it hasn't always been a cakewalk.

Anna Maria experimented with adding a delivery service, but it was too much work and stress. She quickly went back to pickup only. It also took a while to develop an organizational system, but now she has a Google spreadsheet that tracks all her orders. She says that organization is vital with so many different variables. She tracks customer names, flavors, quantities, pickup dates and times, payments, and she does all of this on her own.

After countless cheesecakes, well, I guess technically more than 1,500, the 21-year-old Baker Prenuer is preparing to head off to her dream school, the University of California at Berkeley. She has enough money socked away to cover educational expenses without having to take on any loans. It is a cream come true. But her customers don't need to worry, at least not too much, because she has no plans to desert them. Those customers can still order cheesecakes when she goes back home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, although she may raise the price.

The holidays are her biggest selling season by far, and last Christmas she sold a record 324 cheesecakes in one week. No matter how you slice it, Anna Maria's Cheesecake Side Hustle is a big success. Hey listeners, guess what? No matter how you slice it, you are awesome. I'm so grateful to be able to make this program for you every day, bring you stories like Anna Maria's Cheesecake Hustle, the College Confectionista.

I am so impressed with all the awesome things that people out there are doing, finding a way to pay for college by baking cheesecake or breeding rabbits, which is what the previous story was about. I actually wrote about that one in the book "100 Side Hustles." Speaking of books, I want to give a shout out to a friend of mine, Nomadic Matt, Matt Kepnes. He's got a new book out, or it's actually been out for a month or two, and I am delayed in bringing it to your attention. But if you're interested in travel, the book does deserve your attention. It's called "10 Years a Nomad." Part memoir and part philosophical look at why we travel, filled with stories of Matt's adventures abroad.

He's stayed in more than a thousand hostels, which I have stayed in a lot of places around the world, but I don't think I've stayed in a thousand hostels, so he's got me beat. It's an exploration of wanderlust and what it truly means to be a nomad. Once again, it is "10 Years a Nomad" by Matt Kepnes. I'll link that up in the show notes page. What is that page, you ask?

Oh, that page is sidehustleschool.com/972. That's for episode 972. Inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is better. I'll be back tomorrow. It's the weekly recap coming up and a whole new set of stories all next week.

Thank you so much, my friends. Once again, my name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School. from the Onward Project.