Viral Facebook post saves local bakery

Located at 60 Technology Boulevard Suite 100 is Power of the Almond, a diabetic and keto-friendly bakery and restaurant where everything is gluten and sugar-free.

But when inflation hit businesses hard about six months ago, Power of the Almond was no exception.

“The prices of ingredients have quadrupled and the supply chain issues with just getting our stuff and specialty ingredients in has been really tough over the past six months,” Power of the Almond owner Kirk Hutchinson said.

Inflation added with decline of sales and decrease of profit margin was not a good mix for the local keto bakery, which was weighing a lot on Hutchinson.

“In January, I was down to the point of thinking whether we'll be able to pay this rent month or not,” said Hutchinson. “I was just sitting on the couch all stressed out, then I decided to make a Facebook post.”

At 11:07 p.m. on January 12, Hutchinson posted on the Power of the Almond's Facebook page, urging the community to visit the bakery and non-locals to order goods online that could be shipped nationally.

“It was just like, ‘Let's see if the community helps us,' and it went crazy,” Hutchinson said.

With over 2,000 shares, over 500 comments, and over 800 likes, the post went viral and led to an influx of business for Power of the Almond, both online and in-store.

“We have accumulated like 1500 orders for shipping alone and that's from all over the country. Orders are still coming in and now we're trying to keep caught up with that, so we've been baking nonstop,” said Hutchinson. “After we made that post, we've had a line out the door of customers for two weeks straight. So everything that we're baking is getting sold before we could even ship it. So that's where we are right now.”

When Hutchinson made that post, he was amazed by the community's support all because of a Facebook post.

“The community came out and like everybody started working to support us,” said Hutchinson. “We literally had a line of people who saw that post coming out the door. Then there were just a ton of people that didn't even know about us, so the exposure of getting that post out and being shared over and over really helped us to reach a new market of people that didn't even know we were here. We had people driving from across the state just to come support us and try out the amazing stuff that we make.”

Power of the Almond is open Tuesdays through Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. located at 60 Technology Boulevard Suite 100.