all I had was five dollars to my name how far can a five dollar bill take you with six children to feed and a broken marriage and absolutely no baking skills mignon Francois transforms her five dollar bill into a 10 million dollar cupcake Empire and I've been flipping that same money for the last 17 years into the tune of over 10 million dollars in cupcakes it was a game changer no way I have one secret ingredient that helped me to get from where I was to where I wanted to be today's episode unravels her extraordinary Journey on how she started her business and how you can start your business today with no money foreign [Music] Nashville Tennessee with a local hero mignon Francois and she has started her Cupcake Collection so I have a ton of questions and I want to ask you so let's start with the first one how and when did you start your business yeah I started my business in 2008 in the midst of an economic downturn we were losing everything we had I was living here without electricity many days because I couldn't afford it and walk into the Kroger on the corner to buy bottled water to fill the tubs to bathe my children I was tired of being sick and tired and I had heard the man on the radio say that you could get out of debt by having a bake sale or garage sale problem with the garage sale was I sold everything I had to get to Nashville the problem with the bake sale I didn't know how to bake not even out of a box wow so you literally took that idea and put it into into practice so how did you get the idea of the you know the Cupcake Collection yeah so I was practicing making cake because I believed that I could use that in order to get my family out of debt and I was seeing people call into the radio station screaming we're dead free and I wanted what I felt them have so I started practicing my craft and I learned as I would go to the neighbors and bring them cupcakes they would come back and ask me for more it was when my neighbor who lived in the big red house across the street knocked on my door and asked me to make cupcakes for all of her clients for the season wow and that was going to be 600 cupcakes but all I had was five dollars to my name I was in the back of the house doing this stuffing of cash into envelopes following the baby steps plan that I had learned on the radio when she knocked and so she asked me to do this huge thing of making cupcakes for everyone because they were loving what I was creating I had this sort of perplexed look on my face and she could tell that this thing that she was so excited about I wasn't really excited about not because I didn't want to do it but I knew I really didn't have money to go and buy ingredients yeah so she says to me as you make them I will pay you and I walked to the Kroger around the corner and I bought all the ingredients I could buy with that five dollars and I turned it into 60 that very day wow and I flipped that 60 into 600 by the end of the week and I've been flipping that same money for the last 17 years into the tune of over 10 million dollars in cupcakes over 5 million cupcakes have been sold and Counting and we've done that with no debt no experience no knowledge of the business no loans because I believe that all you have is all you need to get you from where you are to where you want to be oh I love it what a beautiful story and I think you're talking about the same guy that's helped us Dave Ramsey who has taught us how to live on a budget and like you say below your means yeah you know and get to the next step and just keep going at it so wonderful thank you thank you come on in let's go I'm excited [Music] how many cupcakes do you guys produce in a day oh my gosh so it ranges from day to day but let me show you okay I think sometimes it's easier to see because this rack has become empty now okay but you guys got here at about seven and now it's 8 57 and they've already decorated this and if you see that they're they're working on these right here okay and then they've already got in this case wow I mean it looks like there's 400 but I don't know how many there thousands of cupcakes so each one of these racks represents 24 cupcakes well this right here is a hundred cupcakes here this is gonna be full and then this each one of these racks are full all the way to the back they also prepare cupcakes for shipping these are just what's been ordered and what's going to be available for walking so that's not even everything that is so cool so mignon you started on a ridiculous low startup cost of five dollars I mean that's unheard of so I just want to know what did you do how did you start that and how did you get from there to where you're at now yeah I have one secret ingredient that helped me to get from where I was to where I wanted to be you guys you just heard that she has one secret so stay tuned to find out how she got from five dollars to where she's at now what are one of the greatest challenges that you've had starting from scratch and how did you overcome that I think one of my challenges was also one of my greatest assets and that was being in this neighborhood people thought that I was crazy for opening up a bakery here and the neighbors thought poor girl she doesn't even know that she's doomed to fail already but it was the community of the neighborhood that caused other people to want to spread it out so that other people could experience it I think one of the challenges was also that this was the inner city there were just a lot of warehouses and this was Industrial and Commercial very little residential and what was residential was becoming affluent right before our eyes and we weren't in that class of people yeah and so just feeling like we didn't belong here yet this was the place we had made our home offered its own challenges the cupcake truck is a reinvention of your cupcake bus and from what I heard is this this was the first national hat to offer is that true yes it was a game changer no way you guys stay tuned because we're about to unpack what is this bus and how did that change her business moving forward okay I've never driven this before Nick so you better put your seatbelt okay let's do it so what are your main marketing strategies that you implement in your business today or how do your customers find more information about you guys yeah I believe the same things that we were doing in the past are the things that we're doing in the present and for our future because I believe that your past should inform your future and so word of mouth is still the thing that we're using today when people come in and they tell us what they want or need we're listening to our customers but now that we have more money to work with we're doing billboard advertising we have digital marketing we do text message marketing so I love watching you know text messages go out and say the Cupcake Collection has a new flavor and then people can come in and those people who are subscribing to our email marketing are the first to find out about offers and opportunities that we have on the table so besides being able to know when we're doing doing a deal on shipping our cupcakes Nationwide I love being able to save for people hey do you have the inside scoop are you joyriding with me because I believe that Joy is the secret ingredient in our product yeah so we're pulling up on the front of the cupcake election I guess another thing that we do to Market our business is sometimes drive this cupcake bus around because oh it's a cupcake truck now I still call it cupcake Buster yeah but just to drive it around so that people can see that she's back yeah and call her Joy so her name is joy that's great all right so these are just questions from the viewers and they're gonna go quick and fast are you ready for this yes I'm ready okay so La Porta D asked why cupcakes over Donuts or some other food cake is my love language and I believe that cake takes you back to a place where you've been seen and so I could eat cake every single day and I just want to be the best at that awesome love it next question is by Emma asks how did you build a loyal client base in a oversaturated market I Believe by being the best version of myself that I could be the flavor in this cake reminds you so much of my hometown in New Orleans and so I believe that that's the the separator for us excellent cardona's boxing asked can you do this business from home or does it have to be in the actual building that you have to lease to start off yeah this is my home I didn't want to do the business for my home I was looking for a place that I could lease but I didn't have the money that it would require to have a commercial lease at the time so using my home was the best place to start and then my home sort of dwindle as the business began to take over so we had to move out to give the cupcakes more space there you go okay last question by AB ask do you have any HR tool recommendations because we know you have family and friends working for you what do you yeah I made a list of the 100 tasks I did not want to do and I hired people who was who were good at doing those things so I outsourced everything awesome let's go this is a beautiful place out here in Tennessee I love it I love living right across from all of this yeah so tell me I see your team it is an A Team I mean everyone knows what they're doing I mean they're coming in they're smiling they're joyfully happen I want to ask you like how do you manage your team like what systems in place do you have to help your workflow yeah so the way that I manage my team is I listen to them customers yeah they tell me what it is that they need from me it is them that help me to keep everything in line management shouldn't flow from the top down but from the bottom up so we use sort of a upside down pyramid approach in that the people who are cashiering are just as important as the people who are Executives on the team so mostly I'm listening to where they're leading I don't want to be the smartest person in the room if I'm the smartest person in the room then I need to get into another room yeah well I don't think it's an UPS side down approach I think it's more the humility approach you know and I think it's there's a lot of wisdom there too because I think When leaders they get to a position of leadership they feel like they have the authority to do whatever they want but you're the opposite you're like no what do you guys think that's gonna work because they're the ones doing all the work and they're seeing everything right yes so they're bringing that information back to me and the more that I can honor their their work their gift their voice yeah the more they want to bring that information back and it's just like with customers we were listening to customers and I'm listening to staff and these are all the things I believe are making me successful yeah so you mentioned that you are from New Orleans and having a successful operation here you decided to go to New Orleans or you're back to your hometown and start that so that is crazy because out there everything is good and everyone knows how to cook so what were the challenges there that you experienced yeah I believed that I could take my success with me okay but what I learned in the process is you don't get to take your success with you I thought that everybody was gonna know us in New Orleans yeah just because they know us in Nashville and that wasn't true okay so it's the same two years to open New Orleans that it took me to open Nashville wow and it was the same five dollar and seven dollar days that I was having in Nashville that I was having in New Orleans even though we were already successful here wow so they were having to learn to build a business that already had a popularity in another town and a following in another town so that can be crushing for people who think they're doing something wrong when it doesn't just open up and blow up the way you thought that it was going to be yeah but the reason why we brought it to New Orleans was we believed if we could make it there with cupcakes we could make it anywhere it was just up to us and so it just took us more time to learn the pieces that we needed to know and that was in that every situation that we go into we can't go in there with arrogance believing that just because we are who we are that everybody is gonna flock we still had to put in the work and that's what we learned in going to New Orleans so what are the best ways that you can Market your business to your customers with no money do you have any strategies on how to help and how to connect those customers oh yeah I think that word of mouth is worth its weight in gold my only marketing or market research that I did yeah was those large eight foot windows I was looking out of them looking for people who were passing about so you're just like hey come on in no I I didn't even have the store open yet I would walk out there and say hey I'm trying to build this business my family says that what I'm making is good would you taste it I would walk up to complete strangers and so I think it took a bit of confidence in myself to walk with the people who I didn't know for use them to taste something that I was making so apart from running this business you have also written in Memoir so we have viewers that are curious what did you write in there and how did that help you as you know to grow I was a trained journalist first I believe that every stupid thing you've ever had to do is taking you from where you are to where you want to be and I didn't know that I was going to end up in a bakery business because I promised God if he would make me successful I would tell anybody who would listen about what they could do if they only believe so this book is all about all you have is all you need to get you from where you are to where you want to be and when we open this store 15 years ago it was two years I was working every day before that door ever even opened for business and at that time every single thing that we had was within these four walls the ovens the mixers the cash register the case everything was housed inside of here but I opened it with a dorm size refrigerator and a KitchenAid mixer wow and when you see what it's turned into with no debt from a girl who didn't know how to bake I hope that encourages somebody to know that they can do it too all right so tell us your profit margins for your cupcake business that's a really difficult question for me to be able to answer because my team is very involved in how we price our product so they are rewarded for ways in which they save money by sharing in the profits so not I'm not just taking everything home for myself I'm making sure or that they get a benefit out of what it is they're saving for the company so if our profit margin is about 40 to 50 percent on a thing then they're going to always be looking for other ways in which they can save the company money in order for us to all win because it's important to me that they they treat me like a client not a boss and when you give people that ownership they will own taking care of your business not just making sure that they get a paycheck I love that you guys remember that an employee that feels appreciated will always do more than expected you said you are you love to cheerlead people on you know others your teammates I can see that because they're thriving they're all happy and joyful but you have your moments I'm I'm pretty certain and so how do you find the encouragement when you are down you know and for other entrepreneurs as they're listening for this yeah I think that I get my encouragement from my children I'm their biggest fan but they're my biggest cheerleader and it's them that drive me into wanting to be the best because I believe that what I'm showing them is the how that they need in order to get from where they are to where they want to be and if I were to encourage someone else who was an entrepreneur how do you get that sort of you know cheer squad around you you can look to what you already have I believe everybody is given a measure of something right and that is whether it's your family or whether it's your co-workers or it's your partner in business I spent a lot of time at The Entrepreneur Center as well just pouring into other people but you can't pour from an empty Cup right so I have to be poured back into so it's the people who are coming in contact with me every day who are saying keep it going because I need what you're doing and I found out that I could heal people with flour butter sugar and eggs this was something that was going to take them back to a time and place where they felt seen and so because I'm giving them something that they feel seen that someone has made from scratch and with love Yeah it causes them to want to come back and bring that same energy back to me so you mentioned that this was a game changer for you so we have entrepreneurs watching right now and wondering how can I start my business in a very unique way what would you have to advise yeah I would say don't follow the crowd the world is waiting to see whatever you have to offer and I think following my gut and doing what people were asking from me this was the idea of a customer of mine it was fresh back home from California she said there's this thing that they're doing in LA and New York and I think you need to do it in Nashville wow and I was always listening so the art of listening has really helped to shape my business I didn't have to use my big a Windows for market research anymore now I could use my cupcake truck and bring the cupcakes to where they were when I started seeing that people were lining up for miles in order to get cupcakes no I started knowing exactly where I needed to place locations all right so how did you learn the skills to run a cupcake business with no formal background of any food baking and any tips that you would drop to our entrepreneurs are starting this business yeah I would say that I learned from the School of Hard Knocks I did a lot of talking back and forth with my grandmother who was a really amazing Baker and she gave me the things that she knew without a recipe and it was taking cues from the things that I had in the past to inform me about the future and how I was going to use that now so I applied my science background to what my grandmother was doing in the kitchen to create a recipe for Success so the tip that you're recommending is go talk to your grandma Elders there you go I love it all right so what kind of a mindset do you need to have to start any business when I first had first had a collection there were no cupcake shops in Nashville but I told you took it like it was a business every day before my shop even opened because I didn't have money I didn't have credit I didn't have experience in the business I didn't have any knowledge right yeah and I was losing the home that I was living in so what would make me believe that I should now come with my lack of knowledge my lack of experience and open up a cupcake place I believe it's because I had something different to offer the world and now as you look around the Cupcake Collection is the last man standing yeah and I and I love that because your location is not like Prime downtown Nashville where you're surrounded by a bunch of businesses you're kind of in the residential part too and yeah and your business is thriving so that's kudos to you thank you it's funny because my neighbors thought I was crazy and as I walked over to talk to one of my neighbors who had just moved back into her house she was laughing with me saying what did I even know she said because we would talk about you and say this is never going to work so they would pop by sick money in the tip jars to help the poor girl out it's so cool did they know wow it was all working out for my good [Music] well this seems like a really cool place once again here in Nashville Tennessee tell us where are we at you're at the national Entrepreneur Center and our dream was to be the best place in America for you to start and grow a business and I believe that this is what we're accomplishing here and I'm saying we not because I like to speak French which I do but because I get to be a part of the board and what they're doing in the community so not just that I've learned from this place but also I get to teach in this place wow so cool but let's go inside and check it out I would love to show you around thank you all right so you have taken a lot of risk in your business to get to the point where you're at now so tell me which risks that you applied in your life that were maybe not so much worth it and those were that were definitely worth it and also were there any that risks that did not work out for you yeah I think I'm too silly to know which was which I just was always willing to jump I kind of leader that flies by the seat of my pants and I believe that there was always room for growth so if there was a thing that wasn't worth it I think I just counted it up as a lesson that was learned and that was the cost of the lesson but I don't want to be learning the same lesson over and over again does that make sense it does and since you've answered that I love how how much wisdom you have and it sounds like your mom has helped you so much so in other words I mean you spend your devotionals every morning so that has that's empowering you as you wake up to kind of give you wisdom on and discern which mistakes to do or mistake you know things to avoid so I think I like that a lot yeah I'm trying to follow my spirit into everything there you go so earlier you have mentioned that you have one secret that has gotten you to this far I want to know what it is please share with us yeah I believe it's faith I believe that your faith works like money and I believe that faith and money have the same characteristics or properties but I believe that faith has a greater return on investment than money does wow and so I believe that so like money you can't get as much money out of the bank unless you deposit into it right faith is the same way it's according to your faith it will be unto you so however you believe is what you will receive and so I believe that when you operate in faith when you owe you in your n-o-w you will have w-o-n and so a lot of people when they're starting their businesses they believe that they are afraid of failure but I believe that we're afraid of success because you would not start a business and get people rallied around a thing if you truly believed that it wasn't going to work right yeah but when you put all of your faith or your effort or your confidence into a thing you really do believe it's gonna work or you wouldn't waste the time and failure was what you were really afraid of and so the reason why I believe that success is the thing that most people fear is because success requires something yeah success means I've got to get up every morning and I've got to show up to the table when I don't feel like it when I'm tired or when I when all of my family is going on vacation I've got to stay at work and do this thing that now people are lining up for that's the success that makes you afraid and so that's what I want people to see there's a mind shift that happens you're not afraid to fail you're afraid to succeed wow and I can tell how your faith has brought you to where you're at now yeah all right so this is a pretty cool room where are we tell us we're in a classroom at The Entrepreneur Center I told you earlier I got my degree from the School of Hard Knocks yeah and this is where that classroom is yeah as you're learning stuff now you're teaching other people to do the same so there are viewers watching right now that are parents and you as a mother have have six children and you started this business how did you do that with you know with your with my babies with your babies and how can you encourage those parents watching like hey you can do this too tell me what I believe is that I took my experience as being their mother and applied it to business business is a lot like a baby when it's six months old you're not gonna leave it with anybody but by the time my business gets to be a teenager I'm leaving it overnight and saying don't tear down the house and that's the same thing that we're experiencing now I get to leave and walk away and I can trust the people who know what to do down the house so you were 31 when you started your business so there's a lot of people right now that are thinking I want to start my business but I'm in my 30s or even older I mean is that too late to start a business I mean what are your thoughts on that I believe it's never too late to start start for where you are to get to where you want to be people are always thinking they've got to wait for some big amazing thing to happen in order for them to begin and I have learned that studies are showing that four out of 10 people that are starting businesses have already had children and then those who start their businesses after their 30s they're closer to their 40s are finding more success because they have more connections okay they know what the risks are that they're actually getting involved with and they have more experience in the business that they've chosen yeah so maybe while I thought it was the end for me it was only just the beginning because I had learned a lot from the School of Hard Knocks I love it you guys I hope you have enjoyed this episode as much as I have and if you want to learn more about how to start your own business from scratch with very little money be sure to watch our other video with black sunflower founder Jasmine Richard who has scaled her candle business to a six-figure business all from nothing so now it is time for the cupcake cheer thank you [Music]