As seventh grader Timothy Schwartz mixed all of his ingredients in a bowl that day in 2018, he created not only his first batch of bread to sell at school, but also a business: WJBread. Little did he know that his baking endeavors would slowly but surely become massively successful and lead his company to become one of WJ’s most known student businesses in his junior year. However, even before his bread business at this school started, Schwartz was selling cookies in sixth grade.
“I was looking for a way to make money and I went through the options, and I learned that I could bake through my mother and my aunt who is a chef. I started a company called Anarchist Cookies and I sold them in front of Kensington Parkway. My bread company only started in seventh grade when I sold my first plain loaf to a lifelong customer,” Schwartz said.
That lifelong customer was junior Adam Sall.
“I’m definitely proud that Tim’s made it this far with his bread business. I’m also glad he decided to branch out and try making different types of bread,” Sall said.
Schwartz admits that selling bread has changed his life for the better.
“WJBread has definitely given me some money, but it also gives me something to be involved with. I can reflect on myself when I’m baking,” Schwartz said.
Coming into high school, Schwartz decided to start advertising his business on Instagram, which sparked the birth of @WJBread. This, along with his marketing campaign of giving out free samples among his classes, has helped his business gain substantial popularity and reputation.
In the past, Schwartz would go class to class and sell bread to anyone interested, but now it is very common for him to have all of his loaves pre-sold on his Instagram. According to him, he sells bread around every two weeks. The demand for his bread is so high that people wish he increased his supply.
Schwartz responded to these criticisms, saying that making bread takes hard work and time and that he wouldn’t want to sacrifice the quality of his product in order to expand his business. He also states that he wouldn’t want to work with a partner in his WJBread endeavors.
“I’m not looking for a partner. I had a partner back in sixth grade with Anarchist Cookies and it didn’t end well. Ever since then, I haven’t worked with a partner,” Schwartz said.
Students are looking forward to more delicious bread.
“I bought Tim’s pumpkin bread a couple of months ago and it was so good, and now I can’t buy anything anymore because it’s always pre-sold before he even gets to school. I really hope that Tim increases the amount of loaves that he sells and how often he sells them because I need to get my hands on that bread,” junior Ada Hillman said.