Bakery’s Netflix exposure boosts cake business

Watertown’s own Hardcore Sweet recently found its way to many of our screens when the bakery’s owners, Jeremy and Nicole Braddock, competed in the “Junk Foodie” episode of Netflix’s third season of “Sugar Rush: Extra Sweet.”

In the baking competition hosted by Hunter March, the Braddocks competed for baking glory and a $10,000 prize from judges Candace Nelson and Adriano Zumbo and guest judge comedian Fortune Feimster. While the couple competed in all three rounds creating junk food inspired cupcakes, confections and a towering food truck cake they just missed the mark when their pinata cake didn’t have the desired oomph with its explosion.

Jeremy said he “felt good” about how they did in the show, but admitted that he wishes they used a candy with more of a coating like M&Ms or Skittles so the candy would have “exploded more.”

He said they knew that they weren’t going to win when the cake didn’t explode when sliced. “I made it to the end and it was an amazing show,” he said.

“It’s always awesome competing on these shows. It’s a little nerve wracking but it’s not my first time so I’m kind of used to it,” Jeremy said. “It’s always the butterflies in your stomach when you’re gonna compete; you’re running around while the time clock is going [and] you have to perform while thinking under pressure.”

Appearing on “Sugar

Rush” wasn’t the Braddock’s first time on television, Jeremy said the couple have competed on baking shows every year since 2013, when they won a Halloween episode of “Cupcake Wars.”

“That’s what started this whole thing,” he said. The couple has also competed on “Cake Wars,” “Sugar Showdown” and “Winner Cake All.” Jeremy said he and his family sat down and watched the episode when it aired and that it’s funny hearing what the show chooses to include in the episode. “You spend hours and hours filming, so you don’t know what they’re going to put on TV and it’s filmed so far in advance you just forget what you said and what you did. It’s exciting to see it all come to life.”

Jeremy said they filmed their “Sugar Rush” episode in February right before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, leading to the lockdown in mid-March.

“We had just missed the whole scare with travel and lockdowns. We were very lucky to get in and film that,” he said.

Despite not winning the episode, Jeremy said Hardcore Sweet has seen a “100 percent” uptick in business since the episode aired on Netflix.

“It’s been phenomenal, you couldn’t ask for a better blessing during a pandemic. We’ve never experienced anything like this, so for that to air in the middle of a pandemic and bring in new families and business that wouldn’t have necessarily walked through our bakery, it helped,” he said. “I can’t even thank them enough.”