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Interview with Phoenix Sweets
Interview with Metal Works
Specializing in intricate and
delicate tailor-made cakes, as well
as offering high quality cupcakes
and cookies, Phoenix Sweets
moves its hand crafted sweet
treats from an online business to
its first physical shop.
Metal Works, lead by designer
Ivan Keung, offers distinctive,
innovative metal work designs in
a modern, contemporary space.
Tell us about your company
We were an online business for around
two years, known for tailor-made baked
sweets including cakes, cupcakes,
cookies, and others. We used to focus
our business development online
such as promotions via Facebook and
Instagram. PMQ is our first physical
store.
What has your experience been like
having a shop at PMQ?
This is a significant business development.
Running a store in PMQ is fun. There are
lots of interesting customers coming in,
and some of them cannot be reached
by our online platforms including
tourists, art and design lovers who
appreciate higher-quality products and
delicate details.
On top of our existing online
business, we are selling cupcakes
which we freshly bake every morning
at the PMQ store. We cook using
real ingredients such as fair trade
earl grey tea leaves, vanilla seed and
Valrhona chocolate products, which
are, of course, best experienced at
our physical store than online. Our
brand benefits from word-of-mouth
recommendations spread by visitors
to PMQ.
PMQ
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Tell us about your company
Our cake displays and decorations
make our store one of the most visited
in PMQ, and, with a growing number
of the returning customers buying
our cupcakes, we believe that we’ll
be profitable by the fourth quarter of
2014.
What are some challenges of running
a shop at PMQ? Are there any special
challenges for a food company?
PMQ is located near SOHO, an area
where food advocates with high
expectations gather, especially those
enjoying sweets and desserts. They
have great taste and they know the
essence of quality food. Besides, there
are a few very competitive cupcake/
sweets shop nearby (both inside and
outside PMQ).
We target to be a leading brand of
artistic confections. We have to focus
on making the very best of products
such as cupcakes, in terms of both
how it looks and the flavour, to build
up our reputation. So far, our strategy
is to make our cupcakes freshly every
morning, with a less sweet flavor, using
the best ingredients.
Would you recommend that a company
opens up a shop in PMQ?
PMQ offers a great opportunity for local
brands with the ambition to grow and
explore further development. However, for
fresh startup businesses, owners may need
to be sure that they have the uniqueness
and competitiveness to compete with the
over 100 neighbors in the premise. It is
not a charity project which sponsors every
potential business to chase their dream.
Instead, it offers great opportunity for
businesses that clearly know what they are
doing and where they wish to go.
With 8 years of silver accessory design
and production experience, Ivan Keung,
a silver accessory designer in Hong
Kong, created 794729metalwork in
April, 2014. In this store, his unusual
and exceptional ideas can be seen
through his work made of gold, silver
and copper. Apart from his solos, there
are also pieces created together with a
number of local designers and artists.
According to the periodic table of
chemical elements, No.79 stands for
gold, while No.47 stands for silver and
No.29 stands for copper. Ivan Keung
makes use of these 3 elements to
create something different. The work
presented by 794729metalwork are
originally designed by Ivan Keung and
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