by Matt Wright
When I walked into the new Frost Bake Shop location at The Lake District I could tell owner Kristi Kloos had a lot on her mind. Kristi, who owns Frost with her husband Bill, said the work has been not stop for the last two weeks. “We will absolutely be open on Monday, May 2nd,” Mrs. Kloos said. I commented the store immediately puts you in a good mood, with the blue ceiling and the upscale feel. I imagine the smell will make that mode even better once the baked goods hit the shelves. But it took a while to get to this point, longer than they hoped. “We originally planned on opening in January but like a lot of others we’ve dealt with construction delays and supply chain issues,” she said. “That’s not all bad though. We hired our staff here at the Lakeland location back in January and the delay allowed us to provide more training,” Mrs. Kloos said.
Like any entrepreneur opening a new business location, there’s some anxiety and nervousness. But I told her Lakeland was looking forward to the grand opening and in fact, one of Lakeland Current’s most read stories in 2021 was about Frost agreeing to open a location in The Lake District. “Really?” she said with a big smile. “That makes me so happy to hear”. The Lakeland location will be the third store for the couple with East Memphis and Collierville being the other two. Mrs. Kloos says they’ve learned a lot from the other locations and used that knowledge to improve the layout and design of the Lakeland location.
While most people know the great products from Frost, which includes cakes, cupcakes, cookies, and pies, most don’t know the story behind the brand. And like many great stories, family plays a central role. “We originally moved to the Memphis area in 2002 because my husband Bill was the head chef at a restaurant called Ya Ya’s which was in Saddle Creek in Germantown,” she said. But that changed not long after when Bill and his father (Bill Sr.) decided to start a baking business in 2004. The baked goods were all family recipes from Bill Sr’s cherished family cookbook. That business eventually turned into the first Frost location in East Memphis in 2013.
While Bill Jr. and Bill Sr. were busy getting the baking business off the ground, Kristi was busy teaching music to kids. “I was a music teacher for 13 years at Mt. Pisgah Elementary and Bailey Station Elementary,” Mrs. Kloos said. This makes sense if you look at their logo. Look closely and you will notice the “F” in the Frost logo is a musical note. “That’s called a Forte’ in music. It means loud,” she said. She said green was her favorite color so when they opened up their first store it just made sense to combine the two in the logo. Now the couple team together with Bill running their production facility where all the baked goods are made fresh while Kristi operates the front end of the stores. That includes the rentable party room in the back as well as meetings with their wedding and events manager who provides tastings and consultations to customers.
Mrs. Kloos says she is certainly proud of their products but more importantly she’s more proud of the service. “We want to be the Chick-fil-A of the baking world,” she said very emphatically. “That’s why people come back, it’s great food and great service.” She explains like any great business with multiple locations, the goal is to have the exact same product and taste no matter what location you visit. “Since we make everything at our central production facility, and then deliver to stores, it’s much better for quality control,” she said.
In the meantime, there’s still work to do before the grand opening on May 2nd. “I imagine we will be here nonstop until then,” adding, “but we’re very excited to be here.”
To learn more about Frost Bake Shop products you can visit their website at: www.frostbakeshop.com
