20 Ways to Earn More Money in January in Your MicroBakery
January can feel so rough for micro bakers and cottage bakers. Let us help you find ways to earn more money in your cottage bakery! After the rush of holiday orders, custom cookie boxes, and festive markets, sales often drop off fast. Customers are paying off credit cards, diets are starting, and “treat spending” suddenly feels optional. For many small baking businesses, January isn’t just slow, it’s discouraging. Let me help you find ways to earn more money! You might feel like you aren’t good enough, or maybe people didn’t like what you made them in December, or a whole other host of reasons to make you feel less than adequate.
But January doesn’t have to be a dead month. In fact, it can be one of the smartest times for micro bakers to pivot, experiment, and build income in ways that don’t rely on big celebrations or high-volume custom orders. I’m going to walk you through 20 different ideas that you can do to help bring in money in January. Learn about how we’ve made our business not just SURVIVE but also THRIVE in the month of January. Read below for 20 Ways to Earn More Money in January!
20 Creative Ways to Earn More Money in Your Cottage Bakery
1. Mini Scones: Normally I make our sourdough scones at 200g. I’ve been offering 100g scones in a simple bag, and they’ve been a huge hit! Offer reliable flavors, like chocolate chip, maple pecan, brown sugar cinnamon, etc. I charge $2 for these.
2. Grab n Go Coffee Cake: I usually bake our coffee cake in individual 4×4 pans, but for the slower months, I find that baking one large coffee cake and cutting it into smaller slices can be a huge asset. We have been offering $1, $2, and $3 pieces of coffee cake. This gives my customers the option to grab whatever size suits their current need, and it’s not the large $4 tin of 4×4 coffee cake. Basic Cinnamon Sourdough Coffee Cake is always a great seller.
3. Grab n Go Cinnamon Roll: Our regular cinnamon roll offerings come in an 8×8 pan or a 4×4 individual single. I often do plain cinnamon rolls with just a brown sugar cinnamon mixture and a buttercream icing. To help move more product in January, I make $2 grab n go cinnamon rolls. These are an 1/8th of my usual pan, and the customers LOVE it! We do only offer these in our plain. We do not offer them in chocolate peanut butter or other fun flavors because these get put in a bag instead of a small pan.
4. Granola: We offer granola year round, but $5 pint cups of granola are a great seller for me. People love it as a snack by itself, as cereal, or on yogurt. I usually carry at least 5 flavors or granola, but you can do as many or as few as you’d like. Another great thing about granola is it keeps for weeks in the sealed container! You can find my granola recipe in this video.
5. Jam: If your state allows, jam is a great year round seller! We offer this for $7. We are allowed to make jams that are in the Ball book or approved by the National Center for Home Food Preservation. We offer strawberry, cherry, blueberry lime, apple preserves, peach, and red raspberry on the regular.
6. Chocolate Covered Nuts: This is a great add on that’s so inexpensive when you offer small portions. Nuts are expensive, but if you just offer say an ounce or two ounce bags, it can be very affordable for customers and still income producing for you. You can offer chocolate covered nut clusters with pecans, cashews, almonds, or walnuts, and keep your costs lower than if you do pistachios or another more expensive nut.
7. Sourdough Half Loaves: This has been a game changer for us. We always have full loaves of bread available, but we’ve been offering half loaves lately. Our customers LOVE it! We offer the most plain sourdough sandwich bread, but this allows our customers to try fun flavors, like white chocolate cranberry, garlic herb, or cinnamon raisin without committing to a whole loaf.
8. Yeasted Half Loaves: As with sourdough, we always offer full sized loaves. Sandwich bread that’s simply just white yeasted bread is one of our big sellers, but our customers also love pepperoni pizza, taco cheddar, cranberry orange, and more. This is a wonderful addition for families that are small, empty nesters, single people, or for someone who – again – just doesn’t want to commit to a full loaf.
9. Micro Sourdough Boules: Micro sourdough boules have been so fun for us to offer. Sometimes we slice them. Sometimes we don’t. We have a commercial slicer from a grocery store, so we do send all of our full sized loaves sliced. These are great for someone who wants to maybe just have some bread to dip in olive oil with dinner. We offer these at about 200g.
10. Mini Sourdough Boules: Mini sourdough boules are approx 400g. We offer these in many flavors sliced, and they are so pretty. A great option for customers at a cheaper price than a full sized loaf.
11. Biscuits: We offer two kinds of biscuits in our bakery as of now: buttermilk and cheddar garlic herb. We offer these in 2 and 4 packs at a $2, $4 and $5 price point. It’s a great add to a meal, especially in winter when soup, chili, and stew is popular.
12. Bagels: Sourdough bagels are a good seller for us year round, also, but we can offer these in a 1 pack for $2 or a 2 pack for $4, and it helps customers be able to buy some for a special weekend breakfast without breaking the bank. They can choose a fun flavor, like everything or dill, and enjoy a delicious weekend meal!
13. English Muffins: Our sourdough English muffins are another great “under $5” price point for our customers. We offer them in 2 and 4 packs at $2 and $4.
14. Cookies: Everyone loves cookies. While January might seem tough for selling cookies, we have to remember that not everyone is dieting in January. Cookies for us are always a top seller, especially chocolate chip. We offer 6 packs for $6.
15. Biscotti: Sourdough biscotti is a fun treat. We offer these for $2-4, depending on size. Sometimes we coat them in chocolate – sometimes not.
16. Slider Rolls: Slider rolls can be made in an 8×8 pan, like dinner rolls, and they are great way for a family of say 4 to stretch a meal. They can buy a pan of rolls from us for $6 and get 9 little sandwiches out of it. Perfect for a meal.
17. Sandwich Rolls: We offer these for $1 each at 100g per roll. A pack of 4 is $4 and a great addition to dinner.
18. Mini Cakes: Our sourdough mini cakes are very popular. We offer chocolate mostly, but we do sometimes have vanilla or lemon cake. We do peanut butter icing primarily, but sometimes we’ll change it up with mint, vanilla, orange, etc. These are $5 and come in a tidy little container. So a customer can get a treat for $5, have some gut benefit from the sourdough, and enjoy something fun.
19. Mini Muffins: We offer sourdough muffins in 3 sizes: mini, regular, and jumbo. Minis are 5 packs, a regular is just $1, and jumbos are $4. I find that minis and regulars are a great option in January because of the price. We offer a variety of flavors from banana to blueberry or apple or even chocolate chip.
20. Mini Sweet Breads: Mini sweet breads in banana, apple, or cherry are always a great treat for customers. We sell these for $5 in a mini pan, and it could easily be sliced into 6 or more pieces. Customers can grill or toast them, or just eat as is.
Why We Love These $5 or Less Options as Ways to Earn More Money
These options give us our customers a way to still support us but maybe not spend as much. It allows us to make the things we love to make without learning a new recipe. We simply just change up the packaging. Try something “new” in your bakery, and let us know how it goes! We hope you enjoyed learning about ways to earn more money! You can follow us on Facebook to interact with our bakery on the regular!
