Tiara Fluellen wasn’t looking to start a bakery. As much as she had always loved to bake, things just fell into place that way.
“When I was younger, I would be in the kitchen with my mom,” she said. “I literally was sifting flour in elementary school. She would bake, and I would ice the cakes afterwards.”
After her mother passed away in July 2001, Fluellen inherited her renowned red velvet cake recipe. Her mother would usually prepare the cake for Thanksgiving, but that year, when family came to Augusta visiting from her hometown of Miami, Fluellen took it upon herself to take up her mother’s culinary mantle. When the family tasted her rendition of her mother’s red velvet cake, Fluellen says, they were taken aback.
“I guess no one had seen me do it,” said Fluellen about her relatives’ surprise. “My grandma was in tears. She was like, ‘This tastes just like your mom’s cake.’”
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For years after, Fluellen would use her mother’s recipe as family, friends and co-workers requested the pastries for birthdays, but only as cupcakes. Compliments on the red velvet cupcakes became encouragement, as well as suggestions for new varieties.
“Somebody would say, ‘Can you make a caramel cake?’ and I’d say, ‘OK, let me try,” said Fluellen. “So it kind of started from there.”
Fluellen would launch BabyCakes Cupcakes from her kitchen in 2010. Her mother’s recipe provided the business’ signature dessert, Antonella’s Red Velvet cupcakes, alongside 40 other cupcake flavors developed over time.
As she was still only selling cupcakes at the time, a name for the enterprise came easy.
“To me, cupcakes are just baby cakes,” Fluellen said. “And it just tied in together. It’s fitting.”
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The current brick-and-mortar location, BabyCakes Café, opened in November 2019. Fluellen had been working full-time while also making cupcake orders. After nine years, as word of mouth grew, so did the need for a new space, both to maintain a work-life balance and to accommodate the flood of baking requests.
BabyCakes already had a following to put the new dessert shop on good footing at the beginning, but as the COVID-19 pandemic began to stifle business in 2020, Fluellen had to adapt to continue to attract customers. Though by then the menu had expanded to include pies, cobblers, brownies and other desserts, she began adding light lunch dishes to the menu, alongside handcrafted lemonades. The creativity this allowed is one of many blessings in disguise that has allowed BabyCakes to thrive.
Fluellen describes the operation as mostly a “one-woman show.” Everything in the shop is prepared by her, and she does most of the marketing, mainly via social media and promotions like “$2.25 Twosdays,” and “Brunch with Babycakes,” a monthly event she intends to restart in March. Customers can come sample some of the more unique cupcake varieties, such as chicken and waffle, pancakes and bacon and strawberry toast crunch.
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Fluellen would like to expand, she says, perhaps to a larger location; though she doesn’t want to get so big that BabyCakes loses what makes it special.
“Outside of my child, this is my baby,” said Fluellen. “So it’s very hard for me to give this to someone else. I don’t want the integrity of BabyCakes to change.”
Fluellen has considered other ways to expand, as she says she would like to someday have her own special cake mix for sale, as well as BabyCakes aprons and other baking apparel.
The uniqueness at the core of the business has been her mother’s recipe. But Fluellen says what made the recipe special is not any particular secret ingredient — her loving approach, and the fact that it was handed down. Anyone can find a decent red velvet cake recipe online. Fluellen believes Antonella’s Red Velvet is special because it led to BabyCakes Café, which was meant to be.
“It’s just a legacy cupcake,” she said. “I’m so thankful that my mom left me with a jewel. I have something that nobody else has.”
BabyCakes Café is located at 604 Shartom Dr. For more information, visit its Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/BabyCakesCupcakesGA.
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering education in Columbia County and business-related topics for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
