OH juniors Lizeth Gutierrez Mojica, Oscar Lopez, and Vianca Vargas have been running a cookie business, called Choco Bites, all school year, and with much tasty success.
With Mojica in the kitchen, brewing up new menus every week, Lopez and Vargas are selling cookies every Thursday.
“I’ve been selling for [Lizy] officially starting the beginning of this school year,” said Lopez. “I wanted to help her now that she’s homeschooled.”
All three students have been friends since middle school, carrying their friendship over into the business world. “I love her cookies. When [she] used to bring them to class,” said Vargas, “it’s good that she wants to continue doing that so I was like ‘oh, I can help you’ [with selling].”
Mojica has multiple years of baking experience. “I started my baking journey in 8th grade and officially started selling [treats] my freshman year of high school,” said Mojica.
Many students have been looking forward to Thursdays every week, knowing it’s cookie day. One loyal customer, Lia Bauman said, “I am so excited for every Thursday because that is the day that Oscar sells the cookies, it makes me so excited!”
Lopez and Vargas touched on the fact that sometimes they like to make it a friendly competition between the two of them, to see who can make the most sales.
“Yeah, and, because I missed one week, all my loyal customers went to him,” Vargas laughed, teasing her partner in sales.
Just like any business, Mojica requires a certain amount of treats to be sold before payment. “We usually have to sell 52 cookies to get our full payment,” said Lopez. Lopez and Vargas do have a set payment amount. “[We get] $0.50 per cookie, and sometimes she rounds [up or down],” said Vargas.
Payment isn’t always important, because they advertise Mojica and her business. “But in the process… we do end up advertising for her. So if we don’t sell that week, we might sell more next week.”
Tomorrow, the three have decided to take a break from cookies. Instead, they will be selling two different flavors of tres-leches cakes that have not been revealed yet.
“I do actually sell more than cookies, I have sold brownies and tres-leches cakes… which I plan on doing for the next sale,” said Mojica.
This week, you can find Lopez or Vargas in the OH hallways selling their treats. But students are encouraged to get to them quick, because as Vargas and Lopez have discovered, they sell out fast.
Hello! My name is Sydney Saucier and I am a junior at Oswego High School. This is my first year on the 42Fifty staff as a staff reporter. Along with 45Fifty, I am a part of the Science National Honor Society, Business Professionals of America, Oswego Athletic Trainers, and Youth and Government. You can contact me by emailing 42Fifty@sd308.org and putting my name in the subject line. We welcome comments on our articles and feedback on our publication!
