For Goodness Cakes is looking to start their Covington “Sprinkle Squad” with volunteer bakers from across Northern Kentucky to make and hand-deliver cakes to children in foster care and at-risk youth on their big days.
For Goodness Cakes is a nonprofit organization that operates on volunteers who go through an online orientation and food safety course then bake the cakes from their home kitchens. Though the new chapter is based in Covington, there is no home base. All volunteers work from their homes and personally deliver to any agency in Northern Kentucky.
The nonprofit was started in 2016 in California and has since created 22 chapters across the country.
Melissa Gillie first heard about For Goodness Cakes from a friend who volunteered at a chapter in Philadelphia. After learning about the organization, Gillie decided to create a chapter for her community.
“I went to learn more about it and saw that there wasn’t a chapter in our area,” Gillie said. “So, I got a wild, crazy idea to just start one myself because I know there are a lot of foster kids in the Northern Kentucky area. And when I was a kid, my mom always made us really beautiful birthday cakes, and it was a big part of my childhood and my memories. And the fact that there are kids out there that don’t get a birthday cake at all. It’s just, it really spoke to me.”
Gillie needs about 10 more volunteers until the chapter officially starts.
“We haven’t officially started yet other than starting to recruit volunteers and getting people on board so that once agencies make requests, we’ve got people to fulfill that,” Gillie said.
The way the process works is an agency reaches out to a volunteer with a kid and their interests and what kind of cake they like and then gives the Sprinkle Squad member a date the cake needs to be baked and dropped off by.
“For privacy reasons, we’re not actually meeting the kids,” Gillie said. “It’s all happening through the agency. If the agency requests it and the volunteers are interested, maybe, but for the most part, we’re just volunteering and are behind the scenes. Give the kids something special for their birthday and call it a day.”
Though the Covington chapter has not taken off yet, Gillie has received testimonials from agencies across the country on what the cakes mean to their kids.
“The cake went over amazingly,” Nutritionist from Perspectives agency Kay G. said. “Ethan wants to thank whoever made it for him (he asked multiple times to thank them). He was on cloud nine about it! He is usually very shy with showing excitement that brings attention to himself, but he was all into the kids gushing over his cake. That is a huge step for him to get so far out of his comfort zone!”
Because the volunteers don’t interact directly with the kids, each chapter gets feedback through the agencies.
“The cake was beautiful,” Program Coordinator at CommonBond Communities Rachel L. said. “So amazing, in fact, that Sumaya didn’t want to eat it! She actually teared up seeing her name spelled correctly and the detail Katherine put into it. Thank you, thank you for coordinating! We eventually did eat it, and it was delicious.”
Volunteers can choose when they bake cakes. Gillie said it is not a huge time commitment, and it is up to individual Sprinkle Squad members to claim a cake inquiry.
“I think it’s just being able to give more kids powerful experiences that they will never forget,” Gillie said. “We primarily work with underprivileged youth. So, they could be foster kids or kids that are even living in homeless shelters. There’s kind of a wide range of underprivileged youth that we’re open to working with. So, I think as we open more chapters, we just have a wider reach to give kids an opportunity to feel celebrated and to feel loved on their birthday. I think it’s something if you grew up having that it’s easy to take that for granted that, you know, some kids don’t get recognized for their birthday or they don’t feel special on their birthday.”
To sign up to become a volunteer, you can go to the For Goodness Cakes website and take an hour-long orientation that includes food safety training. Once you pass the orientation, you’ll get put into a system that Gillie will use to keep up with volunteers. As she gets requests from agencies, she will send out emails to the Sprinkle Squad to pick up the inquiries.
