E21: The Bagel Ambassador joins The Perfect Rise!

What happens when you spot a gap in the market that should exist… and decide to build it yourself?

BagelFest was born from that exact moment — an idea that didn’t make sense not to exist. In today’s episode, Chef Kimberly sits down with the “Bagel Ambassador” himself, Sam Silverman, to explore how a first-time festival in Bushwick evolved into the beating heart of global bagel culture.

This episode dives into:

• The surprising origins of BagelFest
 • How proof of concept shaped every stage of growth
 • Why community is the true engine behind this movement
 • The mindset shift Sam had to make when the business didn’t go as planned
 • How the Growth Lab and Industry Mixer are rewriting what’s possible for emerging bakers
 • What separates scalable bakeries from struggling ones
 • The trends redefining the bagel world — in the U.S. and abroad

If you’re a baker, founder, or industry professional who’s tired of building alone, this conversation will remind you that your niche matters, your community matters, and your ideas deserve real oxygen.

Sam’s journey is a masterclass in staying curious, staying committed, and building something that lifts an entire industry.

Connect with the Bagel Community:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bagelfest

Website: https://www.bagelfest.com/

Become a Member

Transcript

Welcome back to the Perfect Rise, friends. I am your host. am Chef Kimberly Houston. I am super, super excited to be joined today by the bagel ambassador himself, Sam Silverman. Sam, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for having me, Kimberly. Welcome in, welcome in. So we just met literally in person again for the second time. We met in Vegas the first time at IBIE. Lots and lots of fun. And then... You invited me to Bagel Fest in New York and I was so excited to come last weekend. It was so much fun, so impactful. I think I was looking at it from a completely different lens than a lot of people because I go to a lot of conferences and I was like, there's so much community here. It didn't feel like a conference or a convention or any of the other food things I've been to. I was like, no, this just feels like a bunch of people who love the same thing all in one space. So I was like, this is so fun. I was taking notes. Like I hit every single one of the education classes. I sat in all the seminars and I was like, okay, we have to talk about this. Like I need to say I'm on the podcast because people need to know that this exists. So I'm super, super excited to welcome you to the Perfect Rise. We're going to dive right in. So Bagel Fest started as a 300 person gathering. and is now the world's premier bagel event. From a business standpoint, what were early indicators that this idea had real scale potential? It started with the idea itself. So in 2017, I realized New York never had a bagel festival. And I came to that realization because I'd been going to all these other food festivals around New York City. And I love bagels. And I just I wanted to go to the next event. And I looked up to buy tickets only to discover it was not only not coming up, but it never existed in the history of New York City. Kimberly Houston (02:00.041) And I thought I must have been missing something. Like there's no way that could be possible. There's a pickle festival, there's a hot sauce festival, a coffee festival. But you're telling me the most iconic New York food does not have an event to celebrate it. I started asking around. I asked people to help me find what I was missing. And every single person that I talked to was blown away that it didn't exist. And to me, this was the first inkling that there was business potential here. When you talk to people and they just assume that this thing is already in the world, like, okay, like, clearly there's, it makes sense. The first event that we did in 2019 was the entire goal was just a proof of concept. Sure, this made sense through conversations, but are people actually going to show up? I invited a hundred friends and family plastered posters around the neighborhood in Bushwick. started a Facebook event and I wanted to see would people be interested in attending an event where we brought in bagels, cream cheese, coffee, drinks from all over the city and got to taste them side by side. And to my surprise, we had, as you mentioned, 300 people show up, most of whom were strangers. So the fact that these were people who were coming not to support me, but because they just wanted to go to this event, check mark, proof of concept complete. The following year, 2021, we took a break during COVID, 2021 when we came back, the next marker that we were trying to pass, the next benchmark was attendance. So could we turn it from a 300 person event to a six to 700 person event? This to me was what success would look like. And to my surprise, we had over 1600 people who came to eat, taste and celebrate. And not only that, we had sponsors. who saw the lineup of incredible bagel makers that we had curated and wanted to pay to be a part of the event and a part of the community. And this was really when I realized there's serious potential here, enough so that I started the plot, leaving my corporate job to do bagels full-time. Wow. Sam, that's a lot. I'm sorry. Kimberly Houston (04:27.142) No, it's so good. It's so good because I don't think a lot of people are like, I'm really passionate about this thing. And then they skip over the proof of concept part before jumping feet first into it. And I've seen a lot of that in coaching, like other business professionals. And I'm like, but where's the, how do we know people actually want this? Right. And so the fact that you were like, okay, no, no, no, wait, they want it. and I'm gonna give it to them and I'm gonna leave my job in order to give it to them. So let's talk about that for a second. What did you do first, like operationally? Like if somebody's listening, they're like, man, I've done proof of concept. I know that this thing will work, right? What did you do operationally to get this off the ground? Are you talking for bagel? So bagel up is the business that produces bagel fest NYC bagel tours, bagel making classes. So like bagel up is kind of the business. So do you want to focus on bagel fest or do you want to talk about bagel up as a whole? I kind of want to talk about both. So let's start with which came first. Bagel fest came first. It all started with bagel fest. never intended, I never knew that bagel up and the tours and the classes and all this thing was going to come later. That all came from from just being in the bagel world in the New York City tourism world and seeing that there was a pizza tour and then cop copying that frankly. Yeah, copying and pasting that and then on the tours people kept on asking to learn how to make bagels like okay, like let's figure out a bagel class and it's just And then from the bagel classes, we get people who come because they want to open a bagel shop or integrate bagels into the bakery. So it's like, okay, let's start offering consulting services. So it's just been like a snowball of different things, listening to our customers, our clients, the community, what they want, and then designing products and services to meet that demand. Okay, this is so good. Okay, let's start with Bagel Fest. You don't even know you scratching my brain right now. Let's start with Bagel Fest. Kimberly Houston (06:37.261) What was the first thing you did operationally to like make BagelFest a thing? Like how did you go through that process? Did you have a team? Did you do it all yourself? Like what did that look like for you? The very first thing I did was started an Instagram account, which sounds silly, but keep in mind, I had zero connection to the bagel industry. I had been working at a hedge fund. I was in finance. I didn't work. in bagels. I didn't even work in food. I was just a passionate bagel consumer. to throw a festival is by nature a very community oriented event. I knew I was going to have to get buy in from the community and to get them to do something for me. I knew I had to do something for them first. People are reciprocal. I wanted to add value to this ecosystem and the most natural way for me to do that was to start an Instagram account where I would review different bagel shops, talk about bagel content, talk about news, and most importantly, highlight these bagel shop owners, the bagel rollers, the bagel bakers, the managers, the people who actually make it happen. Because frankly, at the time in 2017, that wasn't really happening. sure, you know, Instagram had come along and food influencers were taking place, but it wasn't this. as saturated as it is today. And especially within the bagel world, like no one was focusing on bagel shops. So the very first thing I did was I wanted to build a reputation as the bagel guy, the bagel ambassador, as I ultimately got coined. And that's how it all started. I spent two years building relationships in the bagel industry, mostly by creating content. And that's where it all began. Wow. There is so much, there's so much goodness in that because I, because I'm doing the podcast and I get to talk to so many people, this feels like one of the first times that it was like community first and not business first, if that makes sense. And I personally love that idea. Like when people are like, well, I can't grow my social media. And I'm like, cause you haven't built a community. Like you're creating content. Kimberly Houston (09:00.77) But who are you creating it for? Like who are you getting to buy into the thing that you're doing? And I think that that is such a powerful thing for entrepreneurs to understand is that don't let social media run you. You run it and use it to build that community to find the people who love the thing that you love. So that to me makes so much sense. Okay. So 2017, we started this. 2019, we have the first Bagel Fest. We take a break in 2020 for COVID, 2021 we're back 1600 people show up. So at what point did you start Bagel up in 2021 or did this come later? It came later. It came after the 2022 Bagel Fest. So 2021, very successful, but almost killed me. Like I was working a full-time job and I was planning what turned out to be a 1600 person festival on top of that. My fiance, She's now my fiance. She was my then girlfriend now fiance future wife is Was really my only support and team at the time we had because we just we had no idea. Yeah, we had no idea I didn't have to I was funding all of this from my corporate job salary. Like there was I had no real experience planning a thousand plus person event like I just didn't know and it was so hard that it almost it truly like almost wrecked me And so I made a vow that before the third annual bagel fest in 2022, that was my line in the sand. I was going to leave three months ahead of time to just put all of my focus and energy on executing the third bagel fest. And that's what I did. to my surprise, so I basically, my rationale was, okay, bagel fest 2021 was profitable. If I double the days, We went, if we go from a one day event to a two day event, double the profit. Guess what? Did not work like that at all. It more than doubled the costs, but it did not double the revenue. It really diffused people across two days. And instead of getting to 3,200 people, we had about 2,200 people, but split across two days where I had to pay the venue for two days. I had to pay the staffing for two days. Kimberly Houston (11:24.228) everything was more expensive, everything was more competitive, because we had been coming out of this COVID environment. So there were tons of other events and travel and people were making up for lost time. And so that was to have taken the leap of faith and left a very cushy corporate job, know, six figure job and benefits 401k, all that good stuff. And to step off of that diving board and go right into the deep end and for it to not go to plan was very, difficult emotionally, financially. But I'd taken the leap and had to figure out, okay, what are we going to do next? Sam, okay, listen. It could just go so many ways because I'm like, no, let's talk about that. So we're going to go with it. Okay. So. One of the things that I think people don't understand about business is that your mindset will make or break you. Like it doesn't matter if the proof of concept works, if it's great, but if you're like, well, this ish didn't work, so I'm not going to do it. Then the dream dies before it even took off. Right? So what did that process look like for you to go, okay, I quit my job. This did not go the way it was supposed to go, but I'm going do it again. Like what? is behind the thought process of not only am I going to do it again, but we're going to be successful when we do it. Talk me through what that was like going through in your mind. Yeah, so we just have to learn and get better and make continual improvements. we just had to have Frank, we collected a lot of feedback from our customers, from our exhibitors, from our, at that point, by the third Bagel Fest, we had a small team and figured out what worked, what didn't, and planned to make adjustments the following year. But we had a little bit of a runway, you know, I Kimberly Houston (13:28.549) I built some savings from my job in the corporate world and I knew I had a year, a year and a half to figure this out. And I wasn't going to give up just from, you know, the very first thing being a little bit bumpy. But it was, was a lot of communication and reflection. Those were the two things was just learning as much as we can from the people who are part of our community and who want us to succeed. And then committing to making those changes in the future years. And in the meantime, starting to run tours where I'd copied Scott's Pizza Tour. So Scott Wiener is the pizza expert in New York City. He started running pizza tours, it must be close to 15 years ago, and has built a very successful business all around showing people the pizza industry in New York City and what makes it so special and great. And I saw that and I saw no one had done that for bagels and I said, okay, it works for pizza. You you think two New York foods, what do you think? You think pizza and bagels? All right, well, I'm just gonna copy Scott. And I took his tour and I told him that at the end of the tour. said, Scott, I'm the bagel guy. I'm gonna do exactly what you did. And to his credit, he was the most generous, the most helpful. He was an open book. it could have gone one of two ways. He could have said, great, good luck, see you later. You know, I'm competition, but he was the complete opposite and said, whatever you need, I'm here to help you let me know and has been a great mentor and a guide and someone that I've been able to kind of look up to. that was really helpful and that kind of kept us going, kept me going at that time, there was no other tour guide but me, but kept me going the rest of the year. And it really kept me in touch with the bagel community because all of a sudden on a daily basis, I was running around New York city, bringing tourists and bagel enthusiasts and bagel makers into their shops and buying their goods and promoting them on social media. So it kept me, it kept the pulse on it. It allowed me to keep the pulse on what was happening in the bagel world. I love that like so much, which one, when I got the, Kimberly Houston (15:49.002) like the reflection or like the poll, like literally a day after bagel fest, I was like, whoa, I've never gotten anything this fast. Number one. And two, the questions were so different. And I was like, this isn't the average run of the mill. Did you like my event or not? Like y'all were asking questions like what worked, what didn't work? Like, are you a bagel enthusiast? Are you a bagel shop owner? Are you, you know, someone who sells supply? Like who are you? Why were you here? How did you feel? And then tell me what you want to see. And it is clear, like damn, this makes sense to me, why the feedback form was written the way it was written based off of the 2022 one, where it was like, okay, how did we go wrong and how do we do this? And I want to highlight that because I think this is where, like, this is the scary part of entrepreneurship. You have a feedback form, but then you don't actually read it. And it's like, but you need to know. people are saying, yeah. mean, we read it in great detail. Our team pours over those responses and you know, bagel Fest was amazing. It was so great, but there's always things we can do better. And those are the things that we focus on, you know, for better or for worse. It's like, okay, how do we get it from an A to an A plus next year? Yeah. And, but it's, critical and it's really difficult. I'm not going to lie. Like I have a fragile ego, like opening that survey. for the first time, it causes physical anxiety. Like I seize up and it's difficult to do, but it's so important because if you don't know what people's reality is in experiencing your product, your service, your event, whatever it is, then you can never make it better. And I'm extremely lucky that we have such a passionate community that gives... by and large, respectful, constructive criticism and feedback that has helped us evolve every single year. Yeah. And that is so, okay, we're going to roll into my next question, but I'm wondering if from feedback, is that what helps you guys start launching things like the Growth Lab and the Inner Circle Industry Mixer? A hundred percent. So the Industry Mixer is something we introduced last year as a way to help Kimberly Houston (18:12.381) industry professionals network and get to know each other. And the growth lab was a brand new event this year that came out of feedback from up and coming bagel makers who wanted to be a part of the weekend, but we couldn't figure out how to slot them in because they're not big enough, mature enough to be an exhibitor at Bagel Fest. Nor does it make sense to put someone who started a year ago in the same room as a utopia and essa and these shops that have been doing it for decades. And so it's been like several years of trying to just understand who's coming to the event, why they're coming to the event, and then what we can do to give them, to add value to their lives and make it a worthwhile trip. you know, Kimberly, when I started this, I didn't know that people in the bagel industry would want to attend. I approached this purely from a consumer, a bagel lover's perspective. And it wasn't like, I didn't expect to get sponsors. I didn't expect to get industry professionals from all over the world. fly in for this. Like it still blows my mind that that happens. so as we've gotten more and more of those people who are really some of the most passionate, they get the most value out of it. It's like, OK, what can we do to create more value for you? And that's just been iterative process of listening to them and trying to design things that work and give them what they want. And ultimately, like you said, it's like community. So like for us, it's facilitating connections like that is the point of a community. It's to build bridges, it's to build a network so that we can support each other. rising tide floats all boats. But you gotta know people in order to be a part of that. Agreed. And it was, think, being able to see things behind the scenes a little bit, like to be at the mixer and to tip in at the very end of the growth lab. Shout out to Flight Delays. But to be able to see and then to be able to hear people talking, I think that was what was helpful for me, even though I wasn't able to experience the full day, because I flew in that day. But listening to other people talk at the mixer about, OK, so when they talked about XYZ, we're going to do it. And people were there with their partners, and they're discussing, here's what we're going to adjust when we get back. Or even for them to be at the point where they can understand there is a place for me. Kimberly Houston (20:32.54) in this industry, even though I'm new, like there's still a place for me. And I think that in itself was super helpful. And then of course, everybody I met on Saturday was like, my God, you were there last night when I got there on Sunday. So it was like, you just built this little community of people that are like, did you taste this? Did you go over there and have this? No, no, no, no, let's go back. Let's go back. Like, let's go over here and get this. And I was like, I'm in New York by myself, but now I'm like, I don't do bagels. Like, I don't know anything about this. And I learned. so much about bagels in 48 hours that I was like, what in the world? I was like, and I went to culinary school. I just did not know all of these different things are a part of it. And everybody was super welcoming. If there was a question, you were getting an answer. Now, if you understood that answer, I don't know. But then somebody else would be like, okay, wait, wait, let me break this down to you. This is what is happening. And I think that that is super important for particularly bagels. As I sat in the room and learned how much chemistry and formulas are going into this, right, for you to come at this from a consumer perspective of, just like to eat them. To be able to sit in and learn how this is made and understanding the type of protein that needs to be in your flour, I was like, dude, I just like to eat bagels. I had no idea that this is what I needed, but those industry professionals were pouring their hearts out. inside of all of those different classes. So kudos to you guys for pulling the right people. They absolutely were telling us how bagels are made, what messes it up, how do you scale your business. And for you to not have come at this from that lens in the very beginning, that's incredible. So I just, I need you to know that. Thank you. Thank you. Well, carry on. Well, I want to just make a point that bagels and I think bakery businesses in particular can be lonely, isolating. Like you are, you are in your bakery, running your business, you are in the business so much. And it's so hard that you rarely have the chance to step outside of that, to take a step back and appreciate everything that you do, let alone commiserate with other people who are in similar situations as you. And I think that's why this has built such momentum is because Kimberly Houston (22:57.615) We've niched down to an extreme degree. We are focused on bagels. that is another important lesson for an entrepreneur is like, find your niche. But when you take these people who are hungry for connection and you give them the platform to do that, of course you're going to see sparks fly. So it's been really magical. Yes. And that's a great way to describe what the weekend was like. It was very, very magical. And I loved it. And I was like, man, I wish I would have ate more bagels, but it's okay. So you've seen, and us talking about bakeries, you've seen hundreds of bagel businesses up close. What differentiates the bakeries that are truly ready to scale from those that aren't? Kimberly Houston (23:48.545) Ultimately, it comes down to the team. And what I learned this year, because we had a panel on scaling business, the main takeaway is you need to have your standard operating procedures documented and trained. You have your staff trained on those. Saying that it's the team is trite. Standard operating procedures is a must. When you scale and you go from one to two, two to three, three to four, all of a sudden you can't be everywhere at once. You can't control the entire process from start to finish. You have to trust people. The only way to trust people is to be able to verify and hold them accountable. And the only way to hold them accountable is to have a agreed upon contract of this is how things are supposed to run. So the number one, yeah, I'm learning this, know, and on the fly too, like through conversation, it's like the number one thing that has unlocked businesses to be able to scale is having their operating procedures written out, documented, trained on, and held accountable to, and having an entire feedback loop that builds on that. Yeah, agree, totally. That was a really, really good panel. All the panels were great. To me, they were all 10s. I don't know. I didn't like one more than the other. But that one was really good. And having standard operating procedures as a thing in your business. For me, I always looked at it just from the perspective of what if I get hurt and I can't do this thing, somebody else needs to do it. But to sit in that room among others, it was like, no, if you want this business to grow, you have to understand you can't grow by yourself. And so your team has to know. how to be you when you can't be there and how else is that gonna happen? You gotta get it out your head and get it on the paper. And I was like, that's a very different way to look at the SOP. So hopefully if you're listening, if you don't have SOP, you start working on it. And the thing I'll say is the main reason I've heard people don't do that is, well things change so much. You know, it's just a waste of time. As soon as I write it down, it's already out of date. Kimberly Houston (26:11.348) Well, it has to be a commitment. It really has to be a philosophy and a commitment to an ongoing process of writing and updating those procedures. And not just so people can mimic what you do, but to allow them to put their own spin and their talents and their creativity towards it. As long as they're hitting those targets, they're going to find a different path to get there. But that's totally OK. And guess what? It might even be better than the way you've been doing it. But as long as they get the outcome that you're looking for, That's what it's all about. Agreed. And when I used to work retail prior to my bakery life, we would get an SOP update maybe once a month. So like, was like, go take this page out of your SOP and put this new page in because the process did change. And I'm like, I can imagine now with AI and all these tools that will allow us to do business more effectively, you just might need to update that SOP. And I think people do a disservice. to come up with the excuse as to why to not do it instead of just updating it after you do it. 100%. Yes, hopefully more people will have an SOP. There'll be more on that coming soon, I promise. Okay, so we know that there is expansive growth. I stood in the room, I saw it. There were people who have businesses, people who have food trucks, people who are thinking about it, people who are dreaming about it. There's definitely some expansive growth happening in the bagel world. What trends? Or shifts are you watching that bakers and founders should pay attention to right now? So the bagel is associated with New York City, and it's associated with a New York-style bagel. And the trend that we're seeing is people are coming up with their own spins on it, their own manifestations of what a bagel is, and they're using the equipment and the ingredients that are available to them in their local market. And that's... Kimberly Houston (28:13.2) So combine like the bagel and then using the bagel as a vehicle for a sandwich are really the two reasons that are driving this significant growth. You add, you sprinkle some social media and new marketing channels on top of that. And boom, this is a powder keg that it is blowing up right now. So it's, it's, I always tell people there's a thousand ways to make a bagel, to make a sandwich, to run a business. And there's not one right way to do it. It's just what's right for you. And we're seeing just unbelievable creativity coming from all corners of the world. I mean, there's bagel shops in South Korea, one that just sold for $160 million to a private equity firm. There's bagel shops in South America and Europe and just like truly all over the place. And they're all catering to the local palettes of their communities. So There's not one right way to do it. You just got to get started and figure out what makes the most sense for you and what do you like and what are your customers like and what are your friends and community like and try to serve that. I think that is really like as you were talking, I started thinking about conversations. I was just kind of listening to or like chatting with the people that were from Copenhagen and like, you know, like from all over. And it was like, no one was really like trying to copy another person. Everybody like had their own spin. Like they, like I just got my own sauce on this over here. Like this is how we're going to do it. This is what works in England and this is what doesn't work. Like here are the things we've tried. This didn't work. And the different types of like the rapid fire questions in all the panels were hilarious. to find out what the bagel operators or bagel owners liked or didn't like about bagels. And I was like, I didn't even know there were flat bagels. I was like, what do you mean there's a flat bagel? And they're like, the scooping out of the bagel. I was like, we scoop bagels now, like put stuff in there. I had no idea that you could do so many things. And the schmear, it was my first introduction to the schmear. I was like, it's just cream cheese. And they're like, no, the schmear. Kimberly Houston (30:32.908) So much deeper, so much deeper than that. I had no idea. But for people to understand like this is what we do. And then you share that with your community and the things that make sense for your community. This is how we do things here because we can't get this New York water or we can't do these types of things, you know, over in California. Like the bagels are going to be different. And I think being able to listen, learn and taste. the differences of the bagels around the US, around the world, because Copenhagen was there. Then that kind of changes your perception of this is not just a bagel in the grocery store. This is more than that. There's something more here than that. And I think it's important for people to understand being you is going to be the secret sauce. You don't have to compete with somebody else. Just do your thing. 100%, could not agree more with that. And it occurred to me as you were talking, people might only have had a bagel from the grocery store before. And I wanna encourage anyone where that's the case, go find a local artisan baker who's making them fresh on site. The difference between one that was made that day using locally sourced ingredients and the care and attention that only an artisan could... versus the stuff that you get on the shelf, which was mass produced, loaded up with sugars and preservatives and maybe frozen. It's been weeks from when it was produced to when it actually gets onto your plate. Like it's night and day. If that's the only bagel you've ever had, you've never had a real bagel in your life. And that was, that was true for me before I moved to New York city. Like I really, so, you know, I just, there's levels to it. And if anyone is bagel curious, go find your local bagel shop and give them a try and ask them for what's warm. Don't just go in and ask them what's warm, what's freshest out the oven. That's gonna be the purest, best bagel that you can possibly get. Peace. I love it. Now we have to do that. I'm have to ask. I wrote down all the ones that were in Atlanta. I was like, we're coming to the Beltline. Okay, yeah. Emerald City Bagels. Shout out Emerald City. Yes, I'm heading They had the most amazing display I've ever seen in the six years of doing Bagel Fest. loved it so much. Kimberly Houston (32:51.905) Clearly the children all love them because they all had the hats on. I was like, where kids get these hats from? And then I was like, oh, this is where the kids are getting hat from. And they're like, you're in Atlanta, you have to come to the store. And I was like, I'm coming to the store because if this is your display, just here, I must walk into your establishment. Unbelievable. Yeah. So I can't wait. You see, and you're like growing businesses from New York and Atlanta. Like it's a whole thing. if I can just. Tell a quick story there. Yes. That is how I got connected with Starship Bagel, who ultimately have won, you know, they won the best bagel competition this year and a few years ago is because they had made it onto the food and wine list of like the best 25 bagel shops in America, maybe four years ago. And someone took my bagel class from Dallas and I told them to go check out Starship Bagel and, or in the owner reached out to me. after the person went in and said, hey, I took this class with the bagel ambassador and he told me to come here and check it out. Orin was so blown away that I had recommended a place that I'd never been to, that I'd never even, but I just like, I'd seen and understood their quality. Like that's what sparked our relationship and has, have then become this amazing. I mean, they were up for a James Beard award last year as a result of some of the attention and press and recognition that they've received. I don't know. It's just, it's really, it really is a community thing and community doesn't mean geographically local to you. It just means who are the people in your life around the world that you have shared interests, shared things in common with. so it's, it's, it's a privilege to be able to share the stories of these amazing, really hardworking bakers around the world. for everyone that comes through. Yeah. And I love it because there's, you know, there's like that paid advertising, but then that word of mouth, like you just, cannot, in no way can you beat, I'm like, I never advertised when I had a bakery. It was all word of mouth. Like if you didn't tell me who sent you, I wasn't taking an order. I need to know, I need to make sure we are family. We are all on one accord to see that. Kimberly Houston (35:20.334) on a larger scale at Bagel Fest. Like there was no, I mean like, yes, there was a competition happening, but like there was no competition. You know what mean? Like everybody was like, did you go over there and taste this? Have you seen, you know, that type of thing where it's like, no, no, no. Like we're all here doing incredible things and like go over there and taste that. The bagel pizzas, my God. I was just like, y'all are actually making pizza. Like right now, in you. yes, hot. Using a bagel dough. So it was a baguette. It wasn't just a regular pizza or a pizza bagel. It was a brand new thing. So this is the sort of creativity that you'll see. She did bagel dough that has been flattened and then made into a pizza. It's it's just it's incredible seeing the boundaries that are being pushed right now in the bagel space. Because who thought to do that? Just like, you know, let's just see if it works. And then it does. And you're like, this is the thing now. Yes, I would like to continue eating this. This conversation has been incredible. So before we bounce, what I want to ask you is if you could give one piece of advice to a baker or a founder in the early stages, somebody who does not have a roadmap the same way you didn't when you came in, what would you tell them? Kimberly Houston (36:44.11) It sounds so obvious, it's just, just put your stuff out there. Just start to do things. Analysis paralysis is the number one killer of a great idea of a great business of a passion. You overthink and you overthink and you overthink and you never take action. never do. Look, the truth is I tried a dozen different. businesses, ideas, whatever, and failed before I landed on Bagel Fest. But I never would have gotten there had I not tried those 12 failures ahead of time. So if you have that spark, if you have that entrepreneurial spirit and you want to get out there, but you don't have that roadmap yet, the only way you're going to create it is by putting your, your self, your spirit, your product, your service into the world, getting that feedback. and iterating and growing from there. So it sounds like the most simple thing in the world. I guess Nike has coined that, right? Just do it. But like, it really, it's so true. It's so Start to stop. I tell people that all the time. Well, whatever is stopping you, start it anyway. Do it anyway. There you go. There you go. That's perfect. It's only crazy till it happens. That's perfect. And like, just do the thing. Sam, this has been incredible. Thank you so much. for agreeing to join me on the podcast. I feel like I've learned everything about you and there's probably still so much more to know. And I can't wait to see how this grows, to see what Bagel Fest becomes next year. Like I'm already excited. If it wasn't in November in New York, I would probably love it more. But as long as that wind is not kicking up like it was last year. It'll be okay. But I was like, Bagels will bring me to New York. Love to hear it. Yes. Thank you for having me, Kimberly. This was amazing. Love talking bagels, love talking community, and really appreciate all the work that the RBA is doing to help highlight and promote bakers across America and keep up the good work. Will do. And for those of you who are listening, make sure you look down in our show notes where you can connect with Sam. You can come join the Instagram community. We'll make sure all of the things and all the places you need to go to be a part of Bagel Fest are listed down below.