London-based baker Reshmi Bennett has just sent a powerful message to all influencers, celebrities, and brands requesting cakes for their personal or work events. Let’s hope they get it.

The confectionery visionary behind Anges de Sucre, an award-winning family-run artisan patisserie, said they get hundreds of requests for cake in exchange for exposure. Even though they aren’t welcome. “I would ‘thank you for reaching out’ but I won’t, because I’m not thankful for your ‘opportunity’ to work for free,” Bennett wrote. “And it’s also clogging up my DMs and inbox.”

Even though Bennett is aware influencer marketing is a massive thing, and “influencing” has become a very popular career choice for many young people, she said it simply does not work for Anges de Sucre. “In particular, hand-made, edible works of art, i.e. cakes, are expensive to produce. They are a luxury.” Bennett even posted a flowchart to cement her point. She’s also sending it to all influencers who ask her for free stuff.

More info: angesdesucre.com | Instagram | Facebook

Baker Reshmi Bennett has just gone viral for standing up to entitled influencers

Image credits: angesdesucre

But she’s well-known for her cakes, too

Image credits: angesdesucre

I wonder if these influencers know who they are contacting when they write to Bennett. She was trained in classical French cuisine in Paris at École Grégoire Ferrandi and then worked in Paris under Michelin starred chefs before starting Anges de Sucre.

Combining classic French cuisine techniques with flavors from around the world, the patisserie whips up and delivers a selection of top-class, hand-decorated cakes around London.

Image credits: angesdesucre

“While my training was classical cuisine, my work experience was in Michelin-starred haute-cuisine. One of the restaurants I worked in had a sudden vacancy in the patisserie section in the summer and as the hot kitchen was like a sauna, I jumped at the chance at being tucked away in the cooler patisserie-side of the kitchen! That’s where I started my patisserie journey,” Bennett explained.

Image credits: angesdesucre

She said starting a small business, building a shop, and running it is a continuous learning curve and she’s still learning. “The most important realization I had was that I cannot do it all. There are certain things I’m good at and certain things I’m not so good/hopeless at and identifying the latter in time has been a challenge in itself.”

Image credits: angesdesucre

Initially, Bennett was trying to manage the shop, the online business, and the kitchen all by herself and it was hell. “I couldn’t focus, I made brash decisions in order to tick boxes, I missed reading the fine-prints and above all, I was tired of feeling tired.”

Image credits: angesdesucre

Eventually, however, she recognized that she couldn’t take care of all these different responsibilities and decided to hire a shop manager and things started falling into place, allowing her to focus much more on what she enjoys the most – creating.

Image credits: angesdesucre

“The reasons why we won’t cake for exposure. I’m tired of the DMs and emails. So it’s gonna be a straight cut and paste of the link and flowchart in response”

Image credits: angesdesucre

Bennett said she definitely isn’t the only professional in the industry who has to deal with unwanted influencer attention. “Cake makers and in fact all food and hospitality businesses are pestered on the regular by these requests,” she told Bored Panda. “Normally, the influencers try to dress it up by calling it a ‘collab’, and I’m thinking that’s because they themselves are embarrassed to call it what it is — begging for a freebie.”

At first, Bennett used to send polite declines or ignore these opportunists altogether but got increasingly irritated by the frequency of them so she started sending more sassy responses. “Usually they respond very defensively, as though they’re shocked that I wouldn’t take up on their offer for ‘FrEe PuBLiCiTy’, or that I’m not flattered that they’ve chosen me for a free cake. It’s baffling really.”

Image credits: angesdesucre

Image credits: angesdesucre

Image credits: angesdesucre

Here’s how a typical conversation with influencers looks from Bennett’s point of view

Image credits: angesdesucre

Image credits: angesdesucre

Image credits: angesdesucre

Here’s another one

Image credits: angesdesucre

Image credits: angesdesucre

“The reaction to my blog post and flowchart has been incredible,” Bennett said. “So many small businesses and creatives have been in support as they all suffer the same. The general public too, who are sick to the back of their teeth being fed the empty and vacuous #gifted #blessed #sponsored #obsessed content by influencers. I’ve heard from so many people that they are actually put off by the companies themselves who enable these blaggers by gifting them freebies.”

The baker stressed that she (probably) doesn’t hate influencers per se but there are professional content creators who have actual jobs, and these blaggers are like a turd at the pool party ruining it for them. “If they think it’s a job, then get paid in cash to do the job. I don’t know any landlord that will accept a cupcake in lieu of rent, so how can these influencers think bagging freebies is a job when it won’t pay their rent? Am I missing something?”

On the contrary, Reshmi. You’re onto something. And the people know it!

Image credits: angesdesucre

People are supporting the baker 100%

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