OVID-19 allowed (or enforced) a pause for reflection, a strategic regrouping that led many Alaskans to seriously consider starting a business. While the class of 2021 is barely past, or still approaching, the first anniversary of their launch, a few of its members have already made enough of a splash that they can be confident of being around for many years to come.

As a single mother caring for four daughters, Bri Foster found herself cooking more meals at home and entertaining and homeschooling her children during the COVID-19 pandemic. “My girls and I would try new recipes for dinners and desserts,” says Foster. “We would use the time to learn how to read recipes, how to work with fractions and basic math. This helped us with homeschooling.”

Foster and her daughters made meals and treats for loved ones they were missing. Foster posted pictures of the desserts on her personal social media accounts, and suddenly people were asking if she could make items for them. “I started out making chocolate breakable hearts, cocoa bombs, and chocolate covered strawberries for friends and family before gaining my business license and credentials,” she says. Foster and her daughters chose the name “Sweet Innovations By Bri” because they thought it suited their desire to make and innovate different types of sweets.

Seeing a demand for the types of desserts she was creating, Foster then had to learn the rules and regulations for a cottage baker as well as how to price items and set menus. She started pages for her business on Facebook and Instagram to build a customer base beyond friends and family. She posted pictures of the creations on the business’ social media pages, which earned some likes and shares, so she tried advertising on Facebook Marketplace and in a few different groups. Business took off.

In the early days of her business, Bri Foster made chocolate breakable hearts, cocoa bombs, and chocolate covered strawberries.

Sweet Innovations By Bri

“I never expected to get so busy so fast,” Foster says. “My first huge sale was Valentine’s Day. Word of mouth got out, and I started to get more and more customers.”

Sweet Innovations By Bri now provides all kinds of sweet items and gifts, including holiday gift boxes, cake stands and dessert table trays, candy grapes, wedding cakes, and more. Foster also caters all types of functions from birthdays and baby showers to weddings and retirements. “I started creating new treats and special gift boxes and have now branched out from cakes and other treats to catering full events, such as being booked for weddings and other special functions,” Foster says.

The Snowy Berry’s kiosk is located in the Midtown Mall in Anchorage.

Snowy Berry

And Foster loves what she does. “I knew when I decided to take that leap of faith in starting the business and just going for it that it was the best decision I could have made,” she says. “This is what I could do and build for my daughters and me.”

Though a “made-to-order only” bakery at the moment, Foster has lots of plans for the future. She’s done some vendor shows and plans to do more. She also wants to hold flash sales during the week when she’s not busy with orders for events, and she has also been looking into how to ship items. “I’ve shipped to rural villages in Alaska, and I loved being able to do that.” Eventually, she hopes to be able to open a store and hire employees. “I’d love to have a storefront/lounge for all my customers to come and enjoy, and I’m saving up for it,” she says.

“I try my best to accommodate each and every customer as best as I can,” Foster says. “I am truly blessed and humbled to have been thought of.”

Hot cocoa bombs exploded in popularity from a kiosk in Anchorage’s Midtown Mall, but the fuze was lit in Florida.

Amanda Solis started baking when her husband was stationed in Melbourne, Florida, south of Cape Canaveral. The Florida Academy of Baking is nearby, and she wanted to take their classes. Because the classes were a bit pricey, she would take one, sell the products she made during the class, and put the money toward the next class she wanted to take. “I was a key spouse for my husband’s chain of command,” she says, “so the chain of command seemed like a really supportive group of people to start something like that.”

Solis ended up taking six of the Florida Academy classes, and when her family moved to Alaska last June after her husband retired from the US Air Force, she brought that baking experience with her. “With the experience I had in Florida, I brought it to Alaska, and there was just so much support from the community and demand for my products, it was crazy,” she says.

The business, Snowy Berry, officially opened in August of 2021 when Solis realized Alaska would be her family’s permanent home, but she actually started selling chocolate bombs and cupcakes in pop-ups at local Anchorage markets about a month or so earlier. “Getting started was a challenge because of creating an LLC, but I’ve wanted to do something like this for a long time, and once I realized I could do it, it was a no brainer,” she says.

In addition to chocolate bombs, which Solis says are her best seller, Snowy Berry sells wedding confections like chocolate dipped strawberries and meringue cookies, breakable chocolates with things like gummy bears inside, French macarons, cookies, and chocolate dipped pretzels. Solis sells quite a bit of product through her online shop as well; however, she only ships within the state of Alaska because of the perishable, fragile nature of her chocolate products. And Solis’s most cherished order? A shipment to Utqiaġvik (formerly Barrow). “Barrow is like at the top of the world, and the woman left a really nice review,” she says.

Solis says she is always looking to add unique and exciting products to Snowy Berry’s offerings and is currently working on several new ideas, including glitter bombs in carbonated drinks. (Think of a champagne fountain.) She also hopes to expand in the future. She opens her mall kiosk only one day a week—or more during busy times. “I think eventually I’d like a Snowy Berry kiosk at every mall in town,” she says. “Long-term I’d also like a small commercial space to sell and work out of.” Solis hopes to accomplish her goals within the next year or two, noting that she started out with a 6-foot table and has moved up to the kiosk, so she’s “moving in the right direction.”

Solis is thankful for her customers who are so enthusiastic about her business. “It makes me happy and encourages me to work even harder and get better,” she says. “A lot of people focus on tourists, but for my business we focus on the actual community, on customers in Anchorage.”

In just a few years, Julie Moraes went from learning to make epoxy resin art to selling it and then teaching the technique.

Julie Moraes Artistry

When COVID-19 waned in the summer of 2021 and people were ready to come together again, Julie Moraes created a new space and a new activity. She shared skills that her customers might someday use to launch their own startup, skills that she picked up only a few years earlier.

It started with drink tumblers. In 2017, Moraes saw some drink tumblers made of epoxy resin on Pinterest, and she fell in love. She started researching how to work with epoxy, and she discovered that the material could make all kinds of unique and amazing art, not just cups.

Enchanted with the technique and its look, Moraes took art classes online. She began making functional art pieces like charcuterie boards, wine glasses, wall hangers, wood trays, ornaments, and necklace pendants. Eager to sell her work, she started participating in local arts and crafts fairs to sell her resin art.

In late 2019, Moraes was approached at the Alaska Chicks Vintage Market and asked to teach a class on how to make resin charcuterie boards. In January of 2020, Moraes started teaching after hours at her friend’s reMADE boutique. “It just took off from there, as there weren’t really any other artists teaching resin classes like mine in Anchorage,” she says. Moraes decided she wanted to make and teach more than food serving boards, so she also began creating ocean- and Alaska-themed wall art and home décor, which she says she loves.

Business was so good that Moraes was able to open her own studio on September 1, 2021, to teach art classes. Located in the Turnagain Arts Building in the heart of Spenard, Julie Moraes Artistry offers a “Just For Kids Painting Class,” mosaic classes for both adults and kids, an adult resin art class, a kids 3D painting class, an Alaska flag suncatcher class, a class on making tumblers with alcohol inks, private classes, and more. Many of her classes are sold out, and Moraes credits her popularity in part to the uniqueness of her classes. “I try to do different types of art classes and projects that no one else is doing. Julie Moraes Artistry isn’t your typical ‘paint night,’” she says. She’s even purchased a Glowforge laser printer so she can cut her own wood shapes for resin and other art projects as well as do custom engraving.

In the not-so-distant future, Moraes plans to move into a larger studio, as she is “quickly outgrowing” her present space. She also wants to add more children’s classes when she has more space. Furthermore, she plans to have other artists and makers teach classes on their specialties.

Moraes’ favorite thing about her work is her interactions with students. “I love seeing the reactions of students when they create something they didn’t think they could do,” she says. “I have people come in and say ‘I’m not creative at all,’ and I always tell them I promise you will make something amazing, and they do!”