In business, word-of-mouth marketing is the oldest and still one of most effective means of building success. When you add a mouth-watering product to the equation, that buzz has proven to be a powerful tool for entrepreneur Shawnda Moye, who serves up The Roaming Biscuit brand to hungry Clevelanders.
We sat down with the owner of The Roaming Biscuit at her 3615 Superior Ave. location (in the Tyler Village building), as well as her new location at 1418 W. 29th Street in Ohio City, to talk about her road as a Black woman entrepreneur maneuvering from pop-up events to two brick-and-mortar locations.
Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
On bringing biscuits to Cleveland
I was originally baking pastries and doing other catering orders. That built my clientele, but I noticed that there was a void of homemade breakfast sandwiches in the area.
Monday through Friday, it was hard for me to find a homemade breakfast sandwich in Cleveland. I found myself doing the “walk of shame” out of McDonald’s or Starbucks.
I’m originally from Cincinnati, but I had lived in the South for several years and prior to following my passion, I was in corporate America. I lived in Virginia, Georgia, and Florida, but when I moved back to Ohio it was still hard to find homemade breakfast sandwiches, specifically biscuits. No one was making biscuits and I didn’t understand why, because biscuits are delicious.
When you think about growing up with parents or grandparents who made biscuits for breakfast or even for dinner, it takes you back to nostalgic times when they were made with love and filled with deliciousness.
I started playing around with the idea that I wanted to start making biscuits and see if Cleveland folks were going to be into it, and thankfully they have been, so that’s what led me to start making biscuits here. Cleveland was my test market.
On moving from “roaming” biscuits, to biscuits in a building
In 2019, I started the biscuit company as just pop-ups. I was using different commercial kitchens. I was using Cleveland Bagel’s kitchen and even The Flying Fig’s kitchen to be able to produce. We would go to different cafes or even other spaces to serve biscuits. We had cafes in Lakewood, the Collinwood area, and on Waterloo that would pop-up. We even had downtown pop-ups.
Just as we started gaining a following, the pandemic happened [and places started shutting down]. We ended up with one location that we were at seven days a week. We were just serving biscuits. It began to build up a following, and from that we started to become popular.
On hitting the bricks (and mortar) with a “Superior” idea.
It was in 2021 when the landlord of Tyler Village (on Superior) reached out to us to see if we would be interested in our own cafe space.
At the time, I didn’t even know about Tyler Village. and I said I’ll take a look and entertain it. I went to see it and said, “I think I gotta take this!”
I already had a business bank account from when we were just doing pop-ups, so that didn’t change. What did change was trying to navigate having a brick-and-mortar where you’re doing it five days a week and still doing pop-ups on the weekends.
We started doing less pop-ups, because we’re now open Monday through Friday. You can get a biscuit from us now five days a week.
Everything was there for me [at the Tyler Village location]. They had ovens there, even an espresso machine – unfortunately there was a cafe that had existed before the shutdown. In order to move in, the only caveat was that we had to do more than biscuits. We also had to serve lunch sandwiches, salads, and pastries because we’re catering primarily to the tenants of that complex. That’s the reason we call the Superior location “The Big Shop and Cafe.”
On building a hometown brand
I didn’t want [the first shop] to be named The Roaming Biscuit, because I knew that I would eventually open up another location. I just wanted to keep that brand separate and just have it strictly all things pertaining to biscuits.
The Ohio City location (W. 29th Street) began with the same process as it did on Superior. The landlord reached out to us to come view the space. The previous tenant was moving out, and some other business owners told them about us. They reached out, and we came to check out the space.
With a location on the east side we could now also accommodate the west side folks who don’t want to cross the downtown mark. This was a chance to build on our following. We could sell to a larger area. Customers can follow us, try our product, and be able to follow the story of us having our own space.
On navigating challenges
This was not an easy path. If you know my team and myself, we have a lot of fun but we hustle hard. We are up super early trying to bring deliciousness to the folks of Cleveland.
Being a minority and being a Black woman, that’s always gonna be a roadblock. Being a Black-owned business, as a woman in business, is always going to be a challenge. I do have support, but if we’re being completely transparent, do you have the same support as your white counterpart? I’d say no.
We have a very humble business. We don’t have investors. Everything that we’re doing we’re working for.
On advice to would-be entrepreneurs
The advice I have for folks looking to start their own businesses is to just do it. You don’t know until you try what fun, what success or what the experience is gonna be like. I’m the type of person that says “Don’t just talk about it, show me. Let’s make it happen.”
One of the things I tell my team is, “Make sh## happen!”
Nothing’s going to be given to you. No one is going to knock at your door asking for you to do this.
Someone may come up with the same brilliant idea that you’ve been sitting on, and because you’re afraid to take that leap somebody else will. It may not be as good as how you would have done it, but maybe they’re successful and then you’re gonna be sitting in your corner thinking “That should have been me.” Make it happen!
Roaming Biscuit is open in Ohio City at 1418 W 29th Street on Saturday and Sunday 7 a.m. – 1 p.m. In Tyler Village, at 3615 Superior Ave., Roaming Biscuit is open Monday to Friday 7 a.m. – 2 p.m. Reach them there by phone at (216) 452-6035, and find Roaming Biscuit on Instagram here.
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