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Mary Ashman

Mary ashman photograph

Mary Ashman and Dalvinder Cheema
Kiss Me Cupcakes
Use Birmingham Central Library

From Drugs Advisor and Smoking Cessation worker to Cupcake queens – it’s not the most obvious career move! However, Mary and Dalvinder embarked on this dramatic career change after falling in love with a cupcake shop whilst travelling in Australia.

Having already been considering career changes before their trip Down Under, Mary and Dalvinder returned to Britain armed with a dream, a cake tin and an icing bag, and launched the business in 2007to limited success. That’s when they discovered the Business Insight Section of Central Library, and the rest as they say, is history!

Dalvinder says: “We didn’t know anything about cashflows or anything like that. We wouldn’t have classed ourselves as businesswomen then, and to have had all that support, marketing, PR, all of that information that we didn’t know anything about, has helped build our business to where we are today”.

Thanks to the vital business and financial support they received, Kiss Me Cupcakes is now going from strength to strength. Their success was highlighted by a report in The Guardian newspaper hailing them as one of the Top 10 cupcake makers in the UK.

With a thriving ‘made to order’ service for special events and several city centre outlets, the girls have now started offering cupcake cookery lessons to those interesting in achieving a similar result at home. With the business growing all the time, the girls are looking to set up their very own city centre cafe bakery in the not too distant future.

Mary said: “We’re very grateful for the support we’ve received so far from the Business Insight team, and we’ll definitely be going again.”

Read about the Faces of the Library of Birmingham

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