New Melbourne bakery sidesteps major investors, secures $50,000 crowdfunding target for community-centred business

A Melbourne husband-and-wife duo has successfully crowdfunded $50,000 to launch their artisanal sourdough bakery, sidestepping the traditional investor model used by many hospitality entrepreneurs trying to open a new business.

Tom Edwards and Betty Milner’s Kickstarter campaign reached its target on Tuesday night, just four weeks after the couple first asked the community to support their dream of opening Iris the Bakery in Brunswick.

The pair say Iris the Bakery, named after their infant daughter, will showcase their unique skills: Edwards, a baker and 15-year veteran of restaurants across Australia and Denmark, hopes to use locally-sourced ingredients to bake a kind of sourdough missing in the local market.

Milner, an industrial designer with extensive front-of-house experience, told Kickstarter backers Iris the Bakery will provide a new community space in Brunswick’s burgeoning Wilson Avenue precinct.

Pledges from more than 360 donors will help the pair secure both a lease on the space and the equipment required to turn the empty premises into a thriving bakehouse and “multi-faceted” hospitality space.

The couple says donors who contributed $20 or more will receive one of the bakery’s loaves once the fit-out is complete.

Rewards extend through to take-home dinner packs, group baking classes, and at the $10,000 level, a pledge to name Iris the Bakery’s signature sourdough after the donor.

But those pledges will not cover every expense required to open the bakery, which the couple hopes to open in May this year.

“As the space will require shop fitting, furnishings and sundries, we will be contributing towards this ourselves,” the couple’s Kickstarter claims.

“We truly believe how special this bakery will be; we are not only putting our life savings into this project, but taking out personal loans as well.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/CmDF83IJRbQ/

While it is common for burgeoning hospitality businesses to secure investments from one major partner or a small collective of investors, and for owners to use their own homes as loan collateral, the couple says their circumstances caused them to pursue alternative financial backing.

Speaking in a video directed at potential supporters, Edwards said: “Being a brand new business, and not owning a home, and being a new family, there are limited financial options available to us.”

The planned launch of Iris the Bakery will occur after a tumultuous period for high-end producers.

Some cult favourite bakeries, like North Melbourne’s Beatrix Bakes, have closed their shopfronts in favour of online-only orders, with sole owner Natalie Paull last year citing the “relentless stress of crisis management over the last two plus years”.

The cost of ingredients, power, and labour have stretched other independent providers to their limit.

While those challenges certainly still exist, Edwards and Milner now have $50,000, and counting, to pursue their entrepreneurial dream.

“With the arrival of Iris and experiencing a global pandemic, it feels important now more than ever to contribute something special to this world and we cannot think of any better way than by creating a neighbourhood bakery for our community,” they said.