The Story Behind Starting Yoko Bakes

To begin with, I didn't really "start" it.

Rather than "starting" Yoko Bakes, it feels more like it spontaneously squeezed out of my life (at incredible speed).

I was bursting with the desire to do it, but that was blocked by the lid of "lacking a place to make them, a place to sell them, and self-confidence." The moment that lid was removed, it just popped out!

For starters, I've loved baking since I was a child. I just love making things; I was in the handicraft club in elementary school and the art club in junior high. I intended to go to art school, but after a single comment from a friend—"You're too smart for that, it's a waste!"—I made a slight change in direction and went to a university in Tokyo to study linguistics.

After that, I got my speech therapist qualification in the UK and started working at a hospital, but it was only recently that I realized baking has been the one consistent thing I've done throughout my life. Everything was telling the story of my life.

From "Hobby" to "Work"

Now, about that baking—I always intended to keep it as a hobby. My main profession was as a speech therapist, and baking was my hobby. That changed significantly during the three years I spent working at a hospital in London. A chain of events happened there, and I started to think, "I want to make baking a job that helps people."

The first change that occurred was the idea: "I want to run a cafe and provide jobs for people in their prime who can't return to work due to the aftereffects of brain damage."

At the time, working as a speech therapist, I sent many people home from the hospital who were young, had brain illnesses, and couldn't return to work due to minor aftereffects. My colleagues and I often felt frustrated, saying, "They could work if they just had a little support!"

So I thought, "Then let's create a workplace with support, bake the sweets we love, and run a cafe!" That was the first spark of the idea to "turn what I love into work that helps someone."

That said, baking was still just a hobby. I didn't have the confidence to turn it into a business overnight, so I continued my days working at the hospital. Meanwhile, events that built my confidence—making me think, "Maybe my baking has something more to it than just a hobby"—happened in a chain.

The power of cake is amazing!

First, there was 3.11. I was in the UK at the time, so I was in a state of shock watching the tsunami footage on BBC News. I was in tears, and along with my Japanese friends living in London, I felt restless, wondering, "What can we do?" I thought I had to do something, and the idea that popped into my head was an event to sell cakes and raise donations: "CAKE SALE - Tsunami Fundraising-".

I don't know how I managed to pull it off, given that I didn't even have confidence as a speech therapist back then, but I first consulted my supervisor, got permission from the department head, took it to the hospital top management, and got the go-ahead.

I emailed everyone I knew at the hospital saying, "I'm holding a fundraising event, please bake some cakes!" On the day, the amount of cakes gathered near the reception was so much that it couldn't even fit on four long tables. Together with my Japanese friends, we sold those cakes and scones for 1 or 2 pounds each, raised a total of about 600 pounds, and donated it to the Red Cross. Through this series of events, I felt the power of sweets, thinking, "The power of cake is amazing!"

The first wedding cake I ever made

After that, I went on maternity leave with the birth of my daughter. During that leave, my supervisor Catherine said, "Yoko, I'm getting married, so please make my wedding cake!" and I replied, "OK!" without thinking twice (lol).

In the UK, weddings are entirely 'handmade' by the bride and groom, so there are no packages like in Japan. It is standard to outsource everything individually, from the dress to the food to the cake.

Although I had taken on the task, I had never made a wedding cake before, so I struggled with trial bakes while my daughter crawled beside me. I read every book I could find, watched endless YouTube videos, practiced repeatedly, and the cake I finally finished was a huge success.

The guests were thrilled and full of praise, and that was when I experienced a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment like I had never felt before. I still vividly remember buying and reading my first book on 'how to make a career out of baking' at that time.

Aiming for an appearance on the popular UK show 'GBBO'

After my maternity leave, I returned to my job as a speech and language therapist, but my passion for baking only grew stronger. I would often think about the next cake I wanted to bake while at work (sorry, patients!).

Meanwhile, there was an unprecedented baking boom in the UK. The catalyst that made baking cakes and bread at home more popular than ever was a TV show called 'The Great British Bake Off,' or 'GBBO' for short.

This show selects 12 amateur baking enthusiasts from all over the UK to compete on air. At its peak, it became a social phenomenon, with average viewership ratings exceeding 20% and the headlines of the newspapers the day after the broadcast always being about GBBO (it's a peaceful country, the UK).

Of course, I never missed an episode, but one day I thought, 'Maybe I should apply for GBBO,' and just for fun, I did. I made it through the phone screening, the first audition, and even the final audition! Although I didn't make it into the final 12, the fact that I survived from 40,000 applicants to the final 50 gave me a huge boost in confidence.

Although I decided that 'Yoko Bakes'

By this point, my desire to 'make baking my job' had become quite clear. The 'discomfort' I felt while working as a speech and language therapist gradually grew, eventually becoming a source of great pain...

At that time, my friend Nicky, who was coaching me on my career, said, 'Yoko, you should bake. Do you have a name decided? Like Yoko Bakes?' I adopted it just like that, and the name was decided. Translated literally, it means 'Yoko bakes sweets.' Really, that's all there is to it (laughs).

Well, once I decided to 'bake and make it my job,' I became pregnant with my second child, and we moved from the cramped and expensive London to the spacious and cheaper suburbs, specifically from London to Bath in the southwest of England. Bath is a tourist destination like Kamakura, so if you have visited the UK, you might have been there on a tour. It is a World Heritage city on the edge of the Cotswolds. I gave birth to my son there, and I was eager to start my baking business after that.

But life isn't that easy... What awaited me was a double headwind: my husband had no job, and the landlord opposed it. With no income, I had no choice, so with a newborn and a 3-year-old, I returned to work as a speech and language therapist. And to reduce the rent that we couldn't possibly pay with my income alone, we ended up moving to an even more rural small town called Frome.

Opening a stall at a popular market two weeks after moving to Frome

This town of Frome is a small town in the southwest of England where a large market is held on the first Sunday of every month, except in the freezing winter. It is called 'The Frome Independent'.

On that day, the entire town becomes a pedestrian zone, and it is a major event that attracts participants from all over the southwest of England. It is very popular, so vendors are on a waiting list. My friend Abbey said to me, 'Yoko, you should apply with your baking!' so I applied half-jokingly, and I was successfully accepted in the amateur category!

Once it came to this, I had no choice but to do it. Without saying a word to the landlord of the place I moved to (since the landlord in Bath had opposed it), I obtained a manufacturing permit for my home kitchen and rushed to prepare for the stall. With the market just two weeks after moving to Frome, I scrambled to prepare flyers, a website, packaging, and so on, and from there, Yoko Bakes expanded rapidly!

So, rather than saying I 'launched' it with a lot of time and effort, 'I was in a situation where I just had to do it, so all the motivation and passion I had built up came out at once' is a more accurate expression.

And so, Yoko Bakes was "born" in Frome, but it was a bit like a premature birth under pressure, arriving underweight. With the next step—moving to Japan—its growth stalled for a time (a story for another day), and what Yoko Bakes is now is essentially being "reborn" once again.

Why did it pause? Why is it being reborn? I hope to continue writing about the reasons and the process behind this.