Freshman year, Daniel Poku sat in his room thinking about a fortune cookie. He didn’t exactly like the taste, but never failed to grab one to check the fortune inside.
Five years later, the idea that those fortune cookies inspired is about to come to reality: CauseCakes, cupcakes with specialized wrappers that push consumers to go outside of their comfort zone and serve.
“At first I had the idea of just putting a fortune in a cupcake, but then I was like, wait, what if it could tell you to do something active?,” Poku said.
Starting September 5, Poku’s idea, with the help of at least 5 other SMU recent graduates, will be sold at the Original Cupcakery in Uptown. With service quests like “Send a letter to someone who raised you” and “Help someone in a community you don’t belong to,” the cupcakes hope to push the boundaries of social enterprise and entrepreneurial service.
“Years ended up going by and I ended up doing the same thing over and over again,” Marc Feldman, another SMU graduate and founder of CauseCakes said. “The biggest benefit of this having a sort of mini-adventure. I sound nuts saying that a cupcake is telling you to do something great, but it will push you out of your comfort zone.”
The cupcakes are just the start of the movement. With a website launching the same day as the first CauseCakes is sold, the group plans to create a social media campaign, with consumers sharing their inspired missions of service. Using the hashtag #UnwrapTheMovement, followers will be able to see the true breadth of CauseCakes’ mission.
Aided by current SMU senior Eric Trexel, friends Poku, Feldman, Paul Curry, Tyler Scott, Kyle Spencer, Tyler Hayes and Lauren Packer are pushing their product into Dallas, after five years of hard work.
“The fact that I’m doing this with my friends was great but it was a challenge,” Poku said. “We laugh and joke more than we are serious. When we had to think about this and how we could make it sustainable we had to dot our I’s and cross our T’s.”
With over $12,000 of funding from a 2013 Kickstarter campaign, the men reached their goal and hope that some day, cupcakes are not the only vehicle for their message.
“We want this to be a gift, a pay-it-forward social movement. And this can really do some damage,” Poku said.
