How this Black-owned food truck focused on desserts became a Bradenton success story
Marisa King has her fans. Lots of them.
Five days a week at 5 p.m. she parks her brightly colored Sweets on Wheels dessert trailer at Mimi 2 Beauty Supply, 925 15th St. E., and watches as the parking lot quickly fills up.
It’s not a small parking lot either, originally built to serve a Foodland grocery.
They come for the brownies, Strawberry crunch cake, red velvet cake, banana pudding.
“The support of the community has been incredible,” said King, 41.
Absent the COVID-19 pandemic, it might not have happened.
When the pandemic arrived in Bradenton, she was working at a nursing home. She had two young children, and had to find other arrangements after her day care closed.
“Honestly, I asked myself what am I going to do? I needed flexibility. What is it that I do well?” she asked herself.
The answer was baking.
So she decided to start a home baking business — even though her bank account was thin.
“I remember not even having enough money for the ingredients,” she said.
Somehow she found enough to buy vanilla wafers and bananas and made banana pudding. She put pictures on her Facebook page and sold 20 bowls of pudding the first day. That was just two months into the pandemic, a time of fear and uncertainty.
Out of that beginning, she found her way forward.
“The next day I made banana pudding and red velvet cake. People like variety,” she said.
Initially, she delivered her baked good to her customers. But after she bought her food trailer two years ago, she parked in one spot where her customers knew to look for her.
“It made a big difference,” King said.
As good as her desserts may be, the intangible ingredient is customer service and trust. King calls that her recipe for success.
“People can spend their money anywhere,” she said.
Almost on cue, Letitia Marshall walked up to the Sweets on Wheels trailer.
“My daughter loves the brownies, and I like the strawberry crunch cake and the banana pudding,” Marshall said.
The Sweets on Wheels Facebook page is full of comments from appreciative customers:
▪ “Girl, this cake was amazingly delicious.”
▪ “I need my strawberry crunch cake so bad.”
▪ “OMG I missed the peach pound cake.”
King was born in St. Petersburg, but raised in Bradenton, where she attended Daughtrey Elementary School, Bradenton Middle School (the current PAL campus) and Southeast High School.
“I love Bradenton, and hope to someday have a brick-and mortar store, and be able to offer online ordering,” she said.
She already knows that she would like to sell her pound cakes online.
The pandemic helped stimulate creativity, King said. “There are more entrepreneurs now than ever.”
“I am very thankful that I started my business. I think it’s all part of God’s plan. It was meant to be,” she said. “I want to tell my story to bring light.”
To know more
For more information, call 941-896-1584 or visit the Sweets on Wheels Facebook page.
This story was originally published February 9, 2023 at 5:00 AM.
