Tracey Noonan’s youngest child, Danielle, was “launching,” moving out of the family home, and Tracey wanted to make sure they continued to do things together. When she saw cake-decorating classes offered, she thought, “Perfect!” More perfect than she ever dreamed.
They loved decorating cakes and were exceptionally good at it. They created elaborate designs in frosting and eventually came up with their own recipes for cupcake flavors, such as strawberry lemon, key lime and peanut butter surprise, all made from scratch using the very best ingredients. Their hobby turned into a business when family and friends wanted to buy their cupcakes. Word spread and more people were ordering cupcakes. They opened a small bakery near Boston, and soon they were getting orders from across the country. That’s when they began packing the cupcakes in Mason jars, two per jar. The jars solved the shipping problem and made the cupcakes stand out from all the others.
They stood out even more when they made headlines. An airline passenger’s Wicked Good Cupcakes Mason jar was confiscated by TSA. The frosting exceeded the 3-ounce limit for liquids allowed on board the flight. Sales skyrocketed.
Two years after opening the bakery, Tracey and Danielle gathered up the courage to go into the Shark Tank. Kevin was the only shark interested and made a royalty deal with them.
Where Are Wicked Good Cupcakes Now?
Kevin says it was the best investment he ever made on Shark Tank. It only took six weeks for Tracey and Danielle to pay him back his $75,000 investment. He continues receiving a royalty for each jar sold.
After the episode aired, they did a year’s worth of business in a week. Today, the company bakes about a million cupcakes a year and ships 500,000 Mason jars. They have had orders from corporations as high as 20,000 cupcakes. They partnered with Hickory Farms, the leader in food gifting, with the Wicked Good Gift Box. They also expanded by launching food truck franchises in Indiana and Florida.
They have two manufacturing sites, one in Pennsylvania operated by Danielle, one in Massachusetts operated by a French executive chef. Tracey takes care of communications and new product development. They now produce pies, cakes and brownies. Tracey’s husband joined the company to handle operations, finances and tech issues.