This local baker has a new spot in Gig Harbor after downtown grocery store closed

Sweet treats from Harbor Cakes have found a new home at Kimball Coffeehouse.

After the Harbor General Store closed suddenly in March, it left Katie Wright, the owner of Harbor Cakes, looking for a place to go.

Wright bakes all her goods in her Gig Harbor home and does not currently have her own physical walk-in space for customers to shop.

Instead, she does custom orders that clients can pick up locally.

She previously rented fridge space inside the Harbor General Store for clients to pick up their custom orders. Their partnership lasted over four years.

As of April 10, she’s set up inside Kimball Coffeehouse at 6659 Kimball Dr. The pick-up fridge is to the right as visitors enter.

Wright said she found out the Harbor General Store was closing when everyone else did.

“I was heartbroken to hear they’d be closing their doors,” Wright said. “They really helped my business get started by partnering with me and giving me that space.”

It took Wright about four weeks and many emails before she found another spot for her treats, she said.

“Kimball was so supportive,” Wright said. “Immediately they were trying to figure out how to make it work.”

The process remains the same for pick up, despite the location change. Customers submit an order online, then Wright leaves it in the fridge at Kimball to grab at the designated pick-up time.

Orders need to be placed at least four days in advance.

There aren’t extras in the fridge to buy on the spot.

She cooks when the kids are asleep

Wright began her baking journey just over six years ago when she was determined to make a cake for her mother-in-law’s 60th birthday.

The cake was a replica of a Coach purse.

“I just started trying to figure out how to do it and teach myself online,” Wright said.

She continued learning new recipes and sharing her creations on social media.

“Friends and family began reaching out, asking me to make cakes for certain special occasions like graduation and birthdays,” Wright said. “At that time I would bake and deliver each cake myself.”

Wright is a mom to four kids ages 17, 13, 12 and 8.

“Family always comes first,” Wright said. “I bake once all my kids are asleep.”

For a brief time in 2017 Wright became overwhelmed with the combination of baking orders and balancing doctors appointments for her 12-year-old daughter who is deafblind.

She took a break from baking, but after running into multiple people around the community asking for cakes, she felt it was time to return.

She reached out to the Harbor General Store and asked if she could set up at a table inside for client consultations and wedding cake tasting appointments, which they agreed to.

Their partnership began in January 2019.

Harbor General also began to sell Wright’s dessert bars. She makes lemon, caramelita, caramel apple pie, and almond raspberry bars.

Shortly after, a local wedding planner approached Wright with an offer.

“He said if I became a licensed food processor, we would team up and I’d bake the cakes for his clients,” Wright said.

Wright took him up on that offer, which involved turning her formal dining room into a second kitchen.

By doing so she created what is called a Food Processing Facility licensed by the state Department of Agriculture.

“It has to be a completely separate kitchen from the household kitchen,” she said. “We walled off the room, added plumbing and doors that lock.”

It’s her own space, she said.

Wright’s business had been steady for a year up until the pandemic.

In 2020 she pivoted, trying to find a way to still offer treats to the community. Cue the summer ice cream cart Wright calls Sweetreats.

She set up outside the Harbor General Store selling local ice cream from Bliss Tacoma.

“The cart worked out very well because people wanted something fun to do while still practicing social distance,” Wright said.

As a result of the Harbor General Store closing, Wright is still trying to figure out a place for Sweetreats to park this summer.

Harbor Cakes has grown to a staff of three: Wright, another baker and a communication coordinator.

“Our website is our online storefront, every order is placed through there,” Wright said. “Everything is made after it’s ordered. I do not keep things on hand. I use real and the highest quality ingredients, organic when I can.”

Although cakes remain her most demanded item, she’s gradually added in other options such as cupcakes, cookies, cakesicles, goodie boxes and dessert charcuterie boards.

On her dessert charcuterie board there’s a cake, vanilla and chocolate cupcakes, lemon bars, brownies, carmelitas, apple pie bars, almond raspberry bars, caramel sauce, sprinkles and cookies.

Wright said she’s baking nearly every night.

Being a business that is home-based allows her to be more flexible with her time. Spending time with her family is her priority, she said.

Although she doesn’t have a space for clients to walk in and pick from a case full of treats, that is something she’s hoping for in the near future.

“Things are in the works,” Wright said. “I can’t share any details just yet.”

When asked what this dream location would look like, Wright described a place where all the baking is done, celebrations could be held, and a bar station for visitors to create their own treats.

She also hinted at her own ice cream line.

Wright is also an advocate for special education for the deafblind community and hopes to host events and fundraisers in her own space.

To place an order for pick up, visit harborcakes.com/shop-our-bakery. The company also has slices of cake and cupcakes in the Tacoma Proctor and Gig Harbor Metropolitan Market locations.