Cakes, brownies, chocolate galore: Caked It celebrating one year at new location

Rachel Kroeger

Staff

May 12, 2025

WAUSAU – A sweet business in downtown Wausau is celebrating one year in its new location at 110 Clark St.

Brittany Long, owner of Caked It, LLC – a dessert shop offering treats from single cupcakes and pastries to made-to-order cakes – said she first learned how to bake from her grandmother.

“My grandma was a baker in Antigo growing up, and she used to always make the most fabulous cookies and everything,” she said. “I used to always try to copy her – I’m still not as good as she ever was.”

About 15 years ago, Long said she submitted some photos of her own delicious creations to Wilton – “one of the biggest cake decorating companies that sells utensils and cake decorating supplies worldwide.”

“I submitted my photos to them, and they actually certified me to be a cake decorating instructor,” she said. “I used to teach cake decorating classes at JOANN Fabrics, so I did that for a little bit of time, and then I took a break and raised children.”

Though she took a break from instructing to be a stay-at-home mom to her seven children, Long said she would decorate and sell cakes to family and friends.

That, she said, led to her husband building her a commercial kitchen in their house and the establishment of a Facebook page.

“(I) started showing off some of my cakes, and then everyone reached out, (saying), ‘Oh, I want a cake, too,’” she said. “Next thing you know, I was doing about 10-15 cakes a weekend.”

As her cakes became increasingly popular, Long said people began reaching out to make cupcake orders, but sometimes only for “one or two.”

“I (couldn’t) have everyone coming to my house just to pick up one cupcake,” she said. “So I eventually opened the store, and (now) we actually do at least 25 different flavor cupcakes every day.”

With support from her customers, her community and particularly her husband, Long said she opened Caked It in 2023 at its initial location on First Avenue. 

That building, she said, was bought after her first year in business to establish “a group home/rehab facility” – forcing Caked It to relocate to its current home on Clark Street.

A family affair

In order to drum up business before moving to its new location last year, Long said she had to utilize a lot of advertising and social media because the building wasn’t terribly visible.

“(Since) we moved (to) a busier intersection, a lot (more) people drive past and see us,” she said.

Offering desserts and baked goods – ranging from her made-to-order cakes and cupcakes to edible cookie dough, dessert bars, specialty chocolate and more – Long said she’s enlisted the assistance of her family to fill Caked It’s cases each day.

Her mother, Long said, “loves” working with customers and is often found at the front of the house, while her sister-in-law works with her in the kitchen.

“I taught (my sister-in-law) how to do a lot of the baking,” she said. “She does the beginning part of the frosting, and then I usually do all the decorating.”

With custom-themed cakes being her bread and butter, Long said Caked It will take on any special request customers throw her way.

“We do any kind of theme, any kind of decoration – there is no cap,” she said. “You can (tell) us anything you want, and we will do it.”

Unlike other dessert shops, Long said Caked It never runs out of baked goods to sell.

“We refill our cases all day,” she said. “We could frost about 20 dozen cupcakes in about an hour, so we’re pretty quick.”

Long said Caked It is increasingly becoming a family affair as some of her children have begun to take interest in the business.

“My daughter – she’s 13 (years old) – she knows how to make and frost everything,” she said. “The only thing she does not do is cakes, but (she can bake) any cupcake (and) fill all the cases, too.”

Recently, Long said she added two new team members to Caked It’s staff – her sister and her first externally hired employee.

“We call (my sister) the ‘dip and drizzler’ because she does all the dipping of chocolate treats,” she said. “She does all the chocolates and chocolate-dipped strawberries and topping (on) the brownies and the bars and anything like that. She’s just not into frosting yet. I’m still trying to teach her.”

With each family member playing a specific role, Long said not only are they able to offer an extensive variety of baked goods, but they also offer 16 different flavors of ice cream, iced coffee and specially made Dubai chocolate-style bars.

“(Dubai chocolate is) a trend on TikTok I saw a couple months ago,” she said. “I was wondering what it was, so I Googled it, and I saw the bars were so expensive – $35 to $45 for one candy bar.”

After reverse engineering the recipe, Long said she discovered how to make her own Dubai chocolate, which she now incorporates into her other desserts and sells as whole bars as well, for $10 a bar.

Name inspiration, community philanthropy

The name of her business, Long said, is inspired after the Netflix show titled “Nailed It.”

“(It’s a show) where people compete, they have to redo a cake that a professional made and try to copy the cake for a prize – it’s called ‘Nailed It,’” she said. “They pretty much say ‘nailed it!’ (but) the cakes are usually horrible.”

Though her business name is inspired by the humorously bad cakes on the show, Long said she really is nailing it with her products, as evinced by Caked It’s increasing popularity.

“We have very high standards for our cakes and what the customers want,” she said. 

Long said as the hours for herself as head baker and owner become longer – “some days, I could be there until 2 a.m.” – she’s started looking to hire additional employees.

“I’m trying to hire right now… but it’s hard,” she said. “We put a lot of love into our business, and it’s hard to find someone who cares as much.”

Caring, Long said, is something she and the Caked It team do in and out of the kitchen.

“We (host) field trips to the bakery for (local) Head Start programs,” she said. “For Head Start, we do it free because they’re a low-income school…They bring in 20 students per class, and we donate a cake (to) each kid – a two-layer cake – that they get to frost, sprinkle and bring home. So, we do that a couple times a year for their school, and then (for) other schools we charge $5-$10 per child, but they get to get their own cake box and everything to go home, and then we teach them how to frost the cake and stuff.”

Though, if any school or teacher were to reach out without sufficient funds for a field trip, Long said she’s always willing to adjust her rates to make baking accessible for all.

“We do a lot of donations,” she said. “If a teacher called me and said, ‘Oh, we don’t have the funding for it, but I really want to bring my kids in,’ I’m going to do it for free.”

For more on Caked It, visit its Facebook page.