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How to Review Your Holiday Season and Plan a Leaner Year | Episode 113

  • Jan 8
  • 7 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

Listen on Apple Podcasts


December is over, the boxes are gone, and you are standing in an empty kitchen wondering whether all of that was worth it.


Most of us skip this part. We close out the busiest month of the year and start planning the next thing before we ever look at what the month actually taught us.


I do a review every single month, and the December one matters most, because it is the month that tells you whether your business is genuinely getting stronger or just riding a seasonal wave. Here is what mine showed me, and how to run the same look at your own numbers.


The number that told me the most

December outperformed November for me, and it did it with one farmer's market instead of my usual two, and with almost no workshop ticket sales.


That is the part worth paying attention to. It was not a record. It was proof that my revenue is spreading out across the month instead of depending on one enormous holiday bake. Sales were steady with a spike at the end when people came in for gifts, which is exactly the shape you want to see.


When you look at your own busy season, do not stop at the total. Ask what produced it. A month that hits its number on one giant Thanksgiving push is a very different business from a month that hits the same number across four ordinary weeks, and only one of those holds up in a slow February.


What sold, and what that tells you

My top sellers in December were gift boxes, and they taught me more than the sales figures did.

  • The savory gift box. A ten by ten box with a demi baguette, an original sourdough loaf scored like a baguette, a small jar of dipping herbs, a bag of crackers, and either a slice of focaccia or a couple of savory scones, finished with a sprig of rosemary, a dehydrated orange and a gift tag.

  • The sweet gift box. Cookies, a brownie, and muffins in the same box. Plenty of people bought one sweet and one savory together.

  • Dozen packs of cookies. This one surprised me. One customer told me she was splitting a dozen into teacher gifts, which is a brilliant use I had not thought of.

  • My original sourdough and my sandwich bread. Always my top two, and in summer they will flip as people back off the hearty loaves.

  • The wintertime loaf, cranberry, pecan and fresh sage, based on a recipe in the Perfect Loaf Cookbook by Maurizio Leo. People stock their freezers when they know it is going out of season.

  • Individual cookies, which only cracked my top list once I had a storefront and could sell them in any quantity.

The thread running through all of it is that people wanted something ready to give. That is a menu decision I can act on all year, so I am looking at keeping a version of the savory box available year round with different packaging.


Here is the discipline part. One customer asking for something is not data. Two is not data either. When a lot of customers reach for the same thing, that is your customers telling you what to build next, and your job is to listen.


What did not work

Menu planning ate too much of my brain. Not because it was complicated, but because I had never built a system around it. I was making the same decisions every week, counting inventory, then counting it again the next day.


So I simplified. One inclusion loaf at a time instead of three. Rotating scone and muffin flavors instead of offering every option every week. I built a full month of pre-order menus at once and scheduled them to release weekly in my pre-order app, so customers can see what is coming and plan ahead. That is a whole month of decisions made once, and it feels so much better! I go deeper into the menu side of this in How I'm Planning My Weekly Menu in My Sourdough Microbakery in 2026 | Episode 115.


I could not predict what walk-ins would buy. A storefront without pre-orders is a guessing game, and guessing produces waste. I am leaning harder into pre-orders and baking only a small number of extras. When those run out, the customer gets a flyer and an invitation to pre-order next time. Leftovers go to the food bank, or once to my hair salon, which turned into marketing instead of lost revenue.


I missed workshop sales. I never got January's workshop schedule live in time for December gift giving, even though people asked all month long. Those tickets would have sold as gifts. It goes on my seasonal prep checklist so next year it happens before December, not during it.


If your sales are lagging right now because everyone just spent their money and ate their weight in cookies, January and February are a good time to teach a workshop. Start with a few friends, feel out the timing, and give yourself a revenue stream that does not rise and fall with bread sales.


What made everything easier

Support did. My assistant was in two or three mornings a week doing prep, dishes, scooping dough and measuring dry ingredients. A college student home for the month helped with packaging, and my mother-in-law came in and tied ribbons on gift boxes for a day.


None of that is glamorous, and all of it is why I was not frazzled in the middle of my busiest month. A front of house team member starts soon so I can stay in the back with the dough. If you have been putting off getting help, Hiring an Assistant for a Burnout Proof Bakery | Episode 111 walks through how I approached it.


Pre-orders were the other steady thing. I run mine through my pre-order app on three pickup days a week, so every order is set aside before the day starts. I also keep freezer-ready dough for cookies, scones and muffins, which means a corporate order for two dozen muffins is a matter of pulling dough and turning on the oven.


The question that changed my menu

My business coach asked me this on a call: what would you do if you knew you could not fail?


My instant answer was that I would do a lot less.


That surprised me, and it is shaping my whole year. Less variety, less inventory to manage, less deciding. When you narrow what you offer, your customers learn what to expect and start planning around you, and you get your mental energy back. If in doubt, do not add it.


If you are a few years in

Run this review with a pen and your sales report, not from memory. Memory is generous about the products you love and forgetful about the ones that ate your whole Tuesday.


Pull your top ten items by revenue for the season and add two columns: how much active time each one took, and whether it can be made ahead or frozen. The items high on sales and low on labor are next year's menu. The ones high on labor and low on sales come off, or get priced properly.


Then pick the one process you rebuilt every single week and write it down as a real procedure. Most of my systems lived in my head, which made me the bottleneck for every question my team had. Getting them on paper is what lets other people help you, and it is the backbone of the review practice in The Simple Review System That Keeps My Bakery Running Smoothly | Episode 116.


Try this in your own bakery

Set aside thirty minutes while your oven preheats and answer four questions about your last busy season:

  1. What sold consistently?

  2. What drained more energy than it was worth?

  3. What decisions am I remaking every week that I could make once?

  4. Where would systems or support change everything?

Write the answers down, and do not skip the fourth one. Even if paying for a few hours of help dents your revenue a little, the energy it gives back tends to come home with interest.


Final thoughts

Clarity comes before growth. January is slow on purpose, and that slowness is the most useful thing about it.


You do not need a bigger menu or a busier calendar this year. You need to know what worked, keep doing that, and let the rest go. Once you have your answers, give the whole year a shape with Yearly Planning for a Microbakery: A Simple 4-Part Framework | Episode 114.


I am so proud of what you built last season, and I would rather see you build something steadier this year than something bigger.


Cheering you on,


Caroline


Keep going

If you like this kind of look behind the counter, these three are the same conversation in other months.


Links to things you might like!


 
 
 

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