Candace Nelson

Oh, yes.

I went from literally, you know, being the cupcake pusher on all of my friends at every party to the producer of the Tyra Banks show calling me and wanting me to make cupcakes for Tyra's 30th birthday.

I mean, this is...

Because I had come from San Francisco.

I had no entertainment or Hollywood connections, right?

And I think it's easy to kind of look at stories like mine.

I mean, Oprah Winfrey talked about her cupcakes.

Every star in Hollywood celebrated with sprinkles.

I'd only watch these people on TV, right?

So it was a testament to the product, you know, a product that didn't exist, a product that was memorable, that people wanted more of.

And also just the fact that what we were doing was innately innovative.

So it got people's attention.

It flew in the face of what they were expecting.

Well, it was really humbling because it was a really tight real estate market at the time.

And no landlords want to rent to anyone who has no experience in retail.

And they also particularly don't want to rent to anyone who has a crazy, innovative, never been done before business idea.

So I could barely get anyone to call me back.

Once I got someone on the phone, I remember one landlord actually hung up on me.

That was rude.

And then, you know, there were a few locations that we went sort of down the road on, but then they fell out for various reasons.