How do you create a category of one when there is no competition? How about building a business creating edible art for brands through pancakes.
Yep, the kind you eat, on Sundays.
Dan Drake, a twenty-something St. Louis native, specializes in making incredible edible art. Pancakes are his medium. He flips people out by creating artwork and character renderings using colored batter and a vivid imagination.
Dancakes is stacking up some significant successes.
Batter Up
To do his art, he works backward. He has to make sure the image resembles the character or person he is drawing. He paints the picture on the pan and then uses a device to paint the batter to create the design.
Videos of how he creates his character art are amazing to watch. Check out his Instagram feed at drdancake and join 318K other breakfast art fans. You can see him in action at this video showing Dan creating all the Star Wars characters – in pancakes.
Initially, his creations look like a blob of color, but the detail emerges when he flips it over. Each pancake is edible, and he has built a business doing events for private parties, companies, trade shows and even promotional events online.
Three marketing lessons from Dancakes
- There is only one edible pancake artist, so he has his little blue ocean to play in. Only Dan makes Dancakes.
- He has artfully used Instagram to gain awareness, and it helps to bring in new leads. His products are so visual, that it screams out to be shared. Businesses love the publicity he brings through his audience.
- He isn’t in the pancake art business – he spends his day marketing sweet, fluffy happiness that looks like your Aunt Joyce or Bart Simpson.
How can you take several things you love, stir them up and create revenue while making customers happy? How can you do something that allows you to say only we (and then fill in the blank)?
A big part of marketing is bringing the magic. Sometimes it comes in the form of a flapjack.
Need marketing advice? Could you use a marketing sounding board that coaches you through your marketing challenges?
You can set up a time to chat using my calendar. Email jeffslater@themarketingsage.com Call me. 919 720 0995. The conversation is free and we can explore if working together makes sense. Try my new chat feature on my site if you have a quick question.
Photo courtesy of drdancake, all rights reserved
