Today we’d like to introduce you to Malia Yap.
Hi Malia, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
Conscious Kids Cookies came to life in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Amidst the challenging struggles of the global pandemic, we recognized a profound need for moments of happiness in the world. While our family was stuck at home, it was hard to find a source of comfort in a constantly changing world. Over quarantine, I reignited my passion for baking—before the pandemic, I had always loved to bake cookies and share them all with my friends and family. I really cherished their smiles as they took their first bite, and I felt so fulfilled when I could make my loved ones happy through something I made with love specifically for them. When met with this idea, my sister and I founded Conscious Kids Cookies, with our mission being to spread kindness through cookies!
I had always had a passion for entrepreneurship since elementary school, selling at local farmers markets, pop-up shops, and school fairs, but running an actual, continuous business for the first time was a completely different experience. In the beginning, we started out Conscious Kids Cookies from our own home. Between Zoom lessons at school or calls with my friends, we baked, packaged, and shipped orders all from our household. This proved to be slightly time-consuming on its own, but I slowly realized how fun the whole experience all was. Having the ability to both pursue something I was really passionate about and simultaneously bring joy to other people’s lives, all while having more than enough free time to spare to embark on this journey, is an opportunity that I am extremely grateful for. The beginning stages of Conscious Kids Cookies introduced me to a completely new world of entrepreneurship that I was mostly unfamiliar with, but it was wonderfully rewarding on its own.
After the stay-at-home orders were lifted and normal society started to slowly resume, we transitioned from household operations into a commercial kitchen in Van Nuys. This was a completely different experience— I was now a normal high school student balancing all my school and extracurricular responsibilities with running my own business. I remember being picked up from school to bake cookies for our most recent order and studying for midterms while our holiday corporate orders were in the oven. Nevertheless, this whole experience taught me a lot about successful time management, and I persisted!
Today, Conscious Kids Cookies has been featured on multiple news outlets, including NBC, CBS, and the Today Show. We have pursued partnerships with community organizations and schools all across Los Angeles, and I’m extremely proud of how far we’ve come! As we continue to the future, we’re looking to further pursue our overall core mission: spreading joy through our cookies! Throughout my time running a business, I have been constantly learning and growing as a person, and I’m excited for all that’s to come!
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
As with any business, Conscious Kids Cookies has met its fair share of struggles. One of the most prominent challenges I have faced has been managing my high school responsibilities with my entrepreneurial responsibilities. When I need to study for three exams over the next week while simultaneously having holiday corporate orders to fulfill, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed at how little time I have to complete all of these tasks. However, through a lot of trial and error, I’ve been trying out various new strategies in order to maximize the amount of time I have to spend on all of my responsibilities.
I’ve been using a planner in order to keep track of all of the assignments I have to do as well as their due dates. This applies to schoolwork as well as personal goals and cookie orders. A planner really helps me avoid procrastination when I know how much time I have left to complete tasks, and it keeps me well-prepared for the work I have to face.
Also, since there are only so many hours in the day, it’s also important for me to utilize both my time at school and my time at home. During free periods, I try to complete as many things as I can at school, and if I can’t do something at school, such as practicing piano, I leave it for home. At the end of the day, since I’ve already completed mostly everything except for my “home” tasks, this gives me significantly more time to package cookies and send orders out without feeling overwhelmed!
Most importantly, I’ve learned the importance of reaching out for help if my workload is too demanding. If I’m super busy that day, my other family members will offer to help me with packaging cookies or putting stickers on our wrapping, and it both speeds up the process significantly while also being a nice (and surprisingly relaxing!) way to spend time with my family as we work together. In addition, I try to communicate closely with my teachers to ensure that they can give me the support that I need. Today, I have a vast network of support that allows me to successfully navigate both the challenges of high school and running my own business.
Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Conscious Kids Cookies?
Conscious Kids Cookies specializes in spreading kindness through cookies! Each of our cookies is imbued with a certain trait, such as happiness, bravery, or determination, inspiring customers to embody these traits in their daily lives. We offer a variety of cookie flavors alongside a range of Filipino-inspired options, providing a diverse selection that caters to different preferences. Our fun and colorful packaging adds an extra layer of joy to our cookies, creating a warm and welcoming atmosphere. In addition, to give back to other kids like us, ten percent of our profits are donated to No Kid Hungry, a nonprofit that strives to combat child hunger in the United States.
We’d be interested to hear your thoughts on luck and what role, if any, you feel it’s played for you?
I feel like luck as a whole is very well representative of the unknowns in life. Whether good or bad, it reminds me that nothing is really static. While you could choose to plan very thoroughly, at the end of the day, not everything will go exactly to plan. You can’t really alter situational factors, but what you can change is how you react to things and how you intend to move forward. Sometimes, when new recipes don’t work out, I’ll have to rethink every step of the process. Did I accidentally put too much flour or baking soda? Were the oven settings just not suited for the recipe? In any case, once I figure it out, I note it down for next time and enjoy my “failed” batch of cookies. One time, when I was making mint chocolate chip cookies, the dough balls merged together in the pan and created one gigantic cookie, so I just adjusted the recipe and shared it with my family. What seems like an absolute failure at first glance could turn into another moment for growth. To me, good luck and bad luck balance out an otherwise relatively organized world, providing a certainty for the uncertainty that I acknowledge and have fun with in my daily life.
Contact Info:
- Website: consciouskidscookies.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/consciouskidscookies?igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA==
