The Gingersnaps Story

Hi friends! 

My name is Kayla.  I am the owner and a pastry chef here at Gingersnaps! I grew up in a family that LOVES to eat just as much as we love an excuse to celebrate!  Birthdays have always been a big deal, and choosing the theme for each birthday cake was an even bigger deal as a kid.  I remember blowing out my candles every year and already pondering what I would choose for my next one.  My mom, Kat, was responsible for all of the baking and decorating of the birthday cakes in our family.  She was self-taught and very skilled.  I would watch her execute a perfect Sesame Street character or Disney Princess with ease birthday after birthday for my sister, my cousins, and myself.  I knew I wanted to learn to do exactly that.  Not only did I enjoy the creativity of it all, but also the excitement and joy in the faces of those seeing their perfectly implemented cakes.  As I got older, I began to make them with my mom, and eventually she passed the duty off to me completely.  By this point it was time for me to decide what my future might be.  At 16 years old I had decided that culinary school was going to be it for me!  

I attended Johnson and Wales University, where I spent two years with some of best chefs in the country, learning everything I could about the art of baking and pastry.  I knew I had found my calling, however about halfway through my second year, I knew that I needed more than just culinary school to reach my full potential.  I graduated from JWU and immediately began studying business management at Dean College.  After completing both degrees, I was so excited to join the field.  I had the fantastic opportunity to work for other custom and wedding cake vendors, but always knew it was my dream to have a place of my own.  It wasn’t until 2018 that I decided the time was right for me to start making my own dream a reality.  

A lot of people ask me, “Why Gingersnaps?”  Well, I knew that incorporating a delicious baked good in the name of my bakery would certainly be expected but in order for it to feel like it was mine, it needed another meaning.  “Ginger” or “Ginge” has been my nickname since I was about five years old.  Not only because of my bright red hair, but also because of the Gilligan’s Island character… there’s a long story about an outfit I wore where the straps wouldn’t stay up and always fell off my shoulder “like a movie star”.  Gingersnaps became the perfect fit for me as well as my story.  

It has always been important to me that when Gingersnaps became a reality, it would be filled with the people I love. Whenever I’m baking, you can almost always find a family member or friend close by; whether they’re watching, assisting, or giving their (sometimes unwarranted) opinion, they are never far away.  My hope is that you get to know them all! Any time you come into Gingersnaps, we want you to feel like you are a part of our big, loving, dysfunctional family.