Ok, like seriously?! Where HAVE I been?
So many things have been happening lately that I get so exhausted by the end of the day, but then I have an idea and just suddenly I have the motivation to stay up and work on something. I look at myself and be like "Come onnnn! Really? Now? Motivated? Can't you keep it for tomorrow?"
Taking many steps back, I've been getting a lot of interview questions on how did the idea of Double A come about?
When Aiman and I first started Double A, we had no background whatsoever in F&B. Our education for sure did not prepare us for this having graduated in Financial Engineering and Aiman in Computer Science - the only one thing we had in common was the love for eating. We used to love going cafe hopping just for the sake of trying that new thing we saw on instagram! We realise that there were so many people who were doing the same and thought hey, people are so willing to travel to get their hands on food! What if we were to house everything-good under one roof?
Unable to bake professionally, we set out to replicate a multi-label model of an online fashion retailer. I remembered telling Vivy "I wanna be like a FashionValet, but for food!". Double A strives to become a one-stop platform that carries outstanding home grown brands that are mostly home based, without a physical shop and does not sell cakes by slices. Collaboration is what we work very hard on! I totally bought this business model and it seemed like many others did too, Alhamdulillah!
The Cafe was 80% up and running within 6 weeks with 3 local cake brands and a local coffee selection! I remembered we used to open only up till 6pm because the lights were not fully installed yet, so we had insufficient amount of natural light to operate at night. Challenges will always be there, we've had some good times, we've had major load of challenging times. In the beginning, it was about getting the words around! How do I get people to come to me, am I not just like any other cafe that sells cakes and coffee? NO. I keep reminding myself that we had an mission to achieve which is to be able to provide a space for customers to come and have amazing cakes from great bakers all around KL! Let us bring to you great cakes in slices!
In this kinda space, we had to work doubly hard to stay relevant because cafes are just mushrooming everywhere. I always emphasis that customer service is THE most important tool we could have an edge on. Know your customers, know their favourtie cup of coffee and have the biggest smile during that 10 hours of working. No matter what you do, customers are always right. Honestly, it's easier said than done.
Close to a year later today, we have a lot more to learn and even more initiatives and campaigns to do! Totally learning a lot from all of these :)
