Mastering the cookie domain

CNY Business Journal (1996+), Dec 10, 2004 by Dickinson, Casey J

SYRACUSE - Tina Corso-Hess's cookies have come a long way since she used her Kenner Easy-Bake oven to make treats for friends. The former realtor and her husband Peter Hess have built a business, called Corso's Cookies, from her cookie-making and creative skills. Corso's Cookies, which employs 14 (seven full-time and seven parttime), will produce annual revenue close to $1 million this year.

In getting there, Corso-Hess has traded her Easy-Bake in for $10,000 worth of professional baking equipment, including a doughrolling machine. The couple financed its, company with personal funds and sometimes credit cards, says Hess.

Corso's Cookies sells "cookie bouquets" through a network of catalog and online gift companies as well as through its own "cookies.com" Web domain. The company receives orders from its marketing partners via the Internet and sends product directly to consumers from its Montrose Avenue bakery in the Town of Geddes.

Hess pursued a partnership-marketing strategy for Corso's Cookies because he believed that it would be easier to market through established sellers rather than trying to build a market from the ground up.

"They take care of the selling and the customer service," he explains; "we take care of creating the product and shipping it out."

To obtain the domain name cookies.com, Hess reached an undisclosed financial arrangement with the New York City-based owner of the domain. The domain owner wasn't interested in selling cookies.com, but he and Hess reached a partnership agreement.

Once an order comes over the Internet, a baker prepares the cookies, another employee decorates the cookies, places them on sticks and passes them to another worker who arranges them into the final design. Corso's shipping department wraps the cookie bouquet to guard against breakage. A commercial delivery service picks up the product and ships it directly to the consumer.

Having an unusual product and the cookies.com. domain has helped bring in orders from across the country, says Hess. These include orders for soap opera stars, "American Idol" host Ryan Seacrest, and a number of other recognizable recipients.

Business is brisk for the holidays, says Hess. On a recent Monday the company had more than 200 orders to fill. "We want to become the largest provider of this type of cookie product," says Hess, "and we want to do it right here in Syracuse."

Corso-Hess improved her baking skills over the years, developing new recipes and providing cookies for friends and family. She tried her hand at selling large cookies through a local coffee shop but realized that the small outlet could never support a business. Corso-Hess subsequently began creating cookie bouquets consisting of frosted butter-creme cookies placed on sticks and arranged like flowers. The medium lent itself to an unlimited number of variations using frosting to add new colors and designs. Cookies.com features a number of designs ranging from a "basket of beer" cookie bouquet to designs celebrating Christmas and Hanukkah. The site offers as many occasional designs as most florists.

"The main attraction of the designs," says Corso-Hess, "is that they're not childish."

Hess says his wife's cookie bouquets were an instant hit wherever she presented one, and he sensed a business opportunity. The couple began selling the bouquets, and Hess reached agreements with outlets such as Wine.com to carry the products in its catalog. Hess delivered bouquets to local companies such as Carrols Corp. and watched how well the products were received. Each time the couple sold a bouquet, the company would receive follow-up orders from people who had seen the product at work.

"Our Internet deliveries produced the same results I'd seen locally," he adds, "when we sold one bouquet in a particular area, more orders followed."

Corso's Cookies has its baking operation just outside Syracuse's western border near the Westvale Plaza. The 2,500-square-foot facility serves as a baking assembly line for cookies.com.

Corso's has streamlined its production process by applying new techniques, Hess explains. Instead of using easily-tipped flower vases, Corso's developed its own steady-standing plastic pot to help workers assemble each bouquet.

Detailed instructions help ensure uniform production. The improvements, says Hess, have allowed the staff to duplicate his wife's designs.