Mahoning County home-based bakery expanding with new storefront
A Mahoning County home baker is getting ready to unveil her first brick-and-mortar storefront where she hopes to connect with regular customers more often and meet new ones.
Christy Fowler is the founder of Youngstown Bakehouse, a home bakery specializing in custom cakes and cookies for all occasions.
Fowler is a mom of four, and her baking journey began as fulfilling family and friends’ cake needs, like school bake sales and birthday parties.
“My daughter loved to bake, so I was encouraging her interest in that,” Fowler said. “As they got older, friends started asking, ‘Can your mom make my birthday cake? Can your mom do this?’ Then, when they all graduated, I was making their friends’ graduation cakes and stuff. I figured it would end when they were getting to be adults, but then all their friends called again and said, ‘Hey, I’m about to get married, or I’m having a baby shower.’ I decided this needs to be something or nothing, so we started Youngstown Bakehouse which has grown since then.”
Youngstown Bakehouse officially began about four years ago, which has grown thanks to positive reviews.
“We have an amazing return customer base, and I adore them so much,” she said. “They all come back. It’s so fun to be a part of; like maybe first it’ll start with a birthday, then a bridal shower, and then you’re there for all of their special occasions, making it to each one of the special things going on. You end up seeing all the major milestones as they go through them.”
Fowler soon began exploring the idea of expanding her bakery business into a storefront as regular customers continued custom orders with Youngstown Bakehouse.
“We have had so much support from the community that it’s just too big to continue out of our home, and we want to continue to be able to provide for all the people who call and ask us to be part of those special occasions, but it’s just a little too much to do out of the house at this point,” she said. “We’ve had an amazing community response just being word of mouth and online based, and so we’re so excited to see what having the storefront will be. We’ve had so much support already.”
Fowler found a spot for the bakery on South Avenue in Boardman, which will be named The Bakehouse.
“We will keep the custom cakes and the custom cookies as a very big part of our focus,” Fowler said. “Then we’ll have daily treats offered in our case that’ll bring in some new faces, hopefully, and the old faces can come in a little bit more often when they just want something little.”
Construction on the bakery has been underway since 2025 with hopes to open in early 2026.
“It was pretty much a wide open space, so we had to put up a couple of walls to close in the kitchen. Those are done,” Fowler said. “It was not built to be a bakery, but it is coming together. It’s taken a lot of work, a lot of vision and a lot of people to pull that vision together. But it is very apparent that it’s coming together now; it’s so exciting to see what was in my brain coming into form in this space. I’m so excited for people to come in, see it and share that environment. Soon, it’s going to be a great community space.”
Place an order online with Youngstown Bakehouse.
