Fresh baked bread and homemade treats offer warmth and comfort unmatched by baked goods on typical grocery store shelves. Melanie Woodward has been unlocking the key to the community’s hearts through their bellies with her home bakery, Get Baked.
Started as a necessity during Covid, Woodward found herself facing empty grocery store shelves and decided to take matters into her own hands. Those hands kneaded the way to a flourishing home bakery business, blossoming over three years to a point where Woodward could funnel the funds back to the community. The baker hosts annual free school supplies pop-ups where she takes the profits from her baked goods and buys a school’s worth of supplies to give away, completely free of charge to her neighbors and community members. From baked-good donations to pay what you can pick up models, Woodward has fostered a community of bread lovers, able to enjoy home-baked goods no matter their financial status.
Woodward’s baking roots tie back to her childhood.
“I would sit in the kitchen with my grandmother, she’s Italian so I would watch her bake while the other kids were out playing with dough, they would be out climbing trees, and I remember always being in the kitchen with my grandmother,” Woodward said.
Although she wouldn’t seriously bake again until starting her bakery, Woodward had an entrepreneurial spirit that led to the creation of many successful businesses.
“I started making commemorative wreaths for police departments that had fallen officers,” Woodward said. Her wreath business grew and she found herself at markets. She noticed the wives would linger at her booth as their husbands grew impatient so she started to make wreaths out of shotgun shells. From there another business emerged where she would make items like wreaths, military plaques and coasters out of ammunition, named What the Shell.
“I got so many people coming into my booth at that point it didn’t even matter to me that I was selling. I met so many people with stories,” Woodward said.
“It was so amazing having veterans come in. I would have a little container on my booth with army men in it and with a note that said, ‘Take an army man home and put it in a place to remember to pray for our military.’” She was able to meet a plethora of people through her booth, making connections with people simply by listening to their stories.
“I love people. I love people’s stories. I love people feeling comfortable enough that they can come to me and share their stories,” Woodward said.
After dabbling in another business called, Get Lit, where she made lamps out of liquor bottles, Woodward eventually took some time off from the market hustle.
“Then I started with the bakery. It was just because I didn’t want to buy bread from the store so then it blew up into this thing, I never even expected it to be this big,” Woodward said.
“These businesses, while they’ve been great and I generate some decent revenue from it, it’s actually the people that I meet there that makes it.”
Running a home bakery allows her to do porch pick ups, where community members can place orders for a convenient experience. She often pops up at markets such as La Cima Farmers Market and Free Range Farmers Market at Wake the Dead Coffee House.
“The whole vendor community, they’re just like a second family and I love everybody that I meet,” Woodward said.
In three short years Woodward has made her mark on San Marcos, winning Best of Hays for Best Bakery in 2024. As much as the community has embraced Get Baked, Woodward has embraced the community back, often doing initiatives where she’ll do a ‘leavewhat- you-can model’. She’ll set out bread for porch pick up and post to the community that they can come and leave whatever they can afford. “You don’t have to pay for it, if you just need a loaf of bread because you’re trying to get to the next paycheck, then go ahead and take it,” Woodward said. “If I get no money from it then at least somebody ate.”
For her school supplies initiative she plans to select teachers in the community to fund their class room decor, through the profits provided by the bakery.
From her Christmas ‘buy a loaf, give a loaf ’ program Woodward was able to donate loaves of her homemade bread to Hays Caldwell Women’s Center and Southside Community Center.
“Being able to give back and do the things that I do has really nothing to do with me and everything to do with this community. They’re the ones that buy my bread. They’re the ones that support my business,” Woodward said. “A huge thank you to the San Marcos community, because of them they are indirectly supporting people in their community that they may not even know.” For more information on Get Baked included the next market and porch pick-up orders visit Woodward’s website at hotplate.com/getbaked.
