In recent weeks, cutbacks and/or closings have been announced by Home Depot, Starbucks and Intel. Even the U.S. Post Office is mulling reducing home delivery from six to five days a week. Let’s face it: Along with the rest of the nation, Rio Rancho is seeing a bleak economic picture.

 

It wouldn’t seem like a good time to open a new business then, would it? Cid Carmona said he and his wife and business partner, Kelly King, didn’t have much of a choice. They’d been planning to open a bakery in Rio Rancho for two years and the timing, as it turned out, landed right in the middle of a recession.

 

The couple’s Enchanted Cookies and Cakes has been open for a few weeks, with a ribbon cutting and a grand opening over the past weekend. The bakery is at 504 Frontage Rd., on the east side of NM 528 and just south of Northern Boulevard.

In the wholesale bakery business for about a decade, the two decided Rio Rancho could use a bakery. “Things were good; the wholesale business was good. The city was growing,” Carmona explained. “By the middle of last year, we took the step, said, ‘Let’s do it.’

 

“We went through a couple of banks, then the bubble burst. The banks shut down — we couldn’t get a loan,” he said. “We did a lot of (the remodeling) out-of-pocket. Accion New Mexico helped.” Enchanted Cookies and Cakes held what Carmona termed a “soft opening,” without any advertising, other than word-of-mouth and passing around some menus in the vicinity of Northern, Quantum and NM 528.

 

“The reception was amazing,” he said. “We’ve had repeat business already.” Carmona said the small bakery employs 22 people, with he and his wife among 16 full-timers, along with six part-time employees. What keeps him smiling in basically tough times for everyone? “Traffic coming in. Our employees. Kind words from the customers and what we’re brining to the neighborhood,” he said. “We’re selling out of cannoli, our hot product.”

 

Carmona said he hopes a new specialty, gourmet bizcochitos, will fare well, too. The jury’s out on that; the couple were showing off their cranberry-raspberry, pistachio and chocolate-hazelnut bizcochitos at a recent Costco show. “We’re adding a little oomph,” he said.

 

Enchanted Cookies and Cakes recently joined the Rio Rancho Regional Chamber of Commerce, which he said has added some more oomph. “I attribute a lot of the business coming in here to the work of the chamber,” Carmona said. “Paul Barabe (of the chamber) has gone out and marketed for us to help us succeed, so that’s significant. “We’re happy to be members,” he said. “In light of the economy and being open two weeks, it feels like we did good. The trick is keeping it going.”

 

See the article in The Rio Rancho Observer