“It doesn’t matter how old you are”

Erika Poussa, born in 1997, is the founder and owner of Bakerika catering. Among her favourite childhood memories are family weekends when they were all gathered in the kitchen, cooking while listening to good music and having drinks. But Erika’s family didn’t bake desserts, so she decided to give it a try. Once the family’s kitchen began to fill up with delicacies, Erika’s mother told her that if she wanted to continue her hobby, she should start spreading the baked goods outside their home. Erika began messaging her friends and neighbours with her first phone, telling them she would start baking cookies, cupcakes, rolls and all kinds of other goodies and asking them if they wanted some. Plenty of people took up the offer, and they eventually ended up placing orders with Erika. 

The turning point came at the end of the ninth grade, when she graduated from elementary school and realised she wouldn’t be accepted into the same upper secondary school as her friends. At that point she began considering for the first time whether she could turn her passion into a career. At 17, she was accepted as a student at Perho, a culinary college in Helsinki. Meanwhile, her business had grown so much that a few larger customers had requested proper invoicing, which led her to establish a limited liability company. At the same time, the bold young entrepreneur walked into a restaurant kitchen for the first time to “learn from the best”, as she puts it.

The most important days of the customer’s lives

Erika points out that her work is very rewarding, and success motivates her to do more. And since food is often enjoyed at social gatherings, Erika thinks it’s wonderful that Bakerika helps create great experiences in important moments in people’s lives. “If someone orders a wedding cake, for example, it’s a great honour for us to be involved in that couple’s big day. The same goes for baby showers or birthday parties. It’s just rewarding and motivating to be able to make other people happy, and yourself also happy, by doing your job.” 

Covid kicked the career 

Erika has experienced setbacks and successes alike during her career. She mentions the Covid pandemic as one of the biggest turning points in her career as an entrepreneur. By the time the pandemic paralysed all of Finland, Erika had been an entrepreneur for 6 years and had just returned from an off-year she took in Australia. During that period, she had finetuned her company’s brand and values. At the same time, she had worked as an extra in a restaurant but decided she wanted to give Bakerika a chance and to commit to it fully. 

The first steps felt very scary, however. In the early spring, she felt good and her business got off to a good start, but when the pandemic hit and all catering orders for the rest of the year were cancelled, Erika had to come up with something new. She began to do “quarantine deliveries”. She set up an online store where customers could order deliveries to their front door. Erika laughs when she recalls those days, saying the whole setup was “awful” in retrospect, although it had a real “let’s try it out” approach to it. 

Erika believes her quarantine deliveries helped her get weekly baking deals from Anton & Anton, an upscale grocery store, and a couple of cafés. At the same time, Erika launched her cookie dough under the Iisi brand and began considering moving into her own premises instead of baking in friends’ restaurant kitchens and having to carry all her equipment around. When she found her current business premises in 2021, she knew at first sight that she had to have them. “I really fought for them,” she says and adds that her idyllic Bakerika café actually serves as her main calling card. 

Recipe of the year

The final turning point in her career came when she won the Finnish Recipe of the Year 2024 competition with her cookie dough recipe. With the award, she got her foot in the door with the retail sector and her products on the shelves of S Group’s stores across Finland. She says people’s reaction to the cookie dough across Finland has been incredible. 

So how would Erika like to encourage other young women entrepreneurs?

“Anyone thinking about whether they should try something out should realise that it’s a clear signal that they’re totally going to regret it if they don’t. It doesn’t matter how old you are. If you have an idea that you can’t get off your mind, then you should definitely try it out. But make sure you’re not doing it for the wrong reasons, like money. You have to be passionate. If you lose your passion, then there’s no sense in what you’re doing,” she says.