Iona Cookie Momster talks about business, giving back to the community

IONA, Idaho (KIFI) - Timanee Olsen, also known as the Iona Cookie Momster, has been serving up delicious treats since 2017.

Olsen says it all happened after making cookies for an ugly Christmas sweater party, and she posted the pictures of the cookies onto Facebook.

"One of my friends saw the cookies and was like, 'I'm having an ugly Christmas sweater party. Those are darling. Would you want to make some for me?' And it completely caught me off guard, but I was super excited," Olsen said. "So I figured out how much it was going to cost, messaged her back. She's like, 'Go for it'. So I made some really ugly but really cute Christmas sweater cookies for her."

One of the party attendees worked at Home Depot, who was also having an ugly Christmas sweater party and wanted cookies for it.

"It was like 100 or more cookies it was a big, big order," Olsen says she was initially hesitant but agreed to do it. "It was like the best thing ever and life just went on as normal. But then as the days started coming and passing and everything, I just started getting messages on Facebook."

Word spread of her talent, and everyone wanted to get some cookies.

What started as a 25 cookie-cutter operation transformed into a booming business.

"Next thing you know, I'm over 2000 cookie cutters. I have an amazing following, I'm booked two months in advance," Olsen said. "It was just kind of like fast and furious and it just took off and it's been so wonderful and it's been so chaotic but I would not trade it."

But like with any business, there were some bumps along the way.

After she first started, Olsen had the opportunity to sell cookies at Soda Tsunami, and later Mrs. Powell's in Idaho Falls, Rigby, and Rexburg.

She then became more familiar with the cottage laws in Idaho.

"I had to learn the hard way and all of that got ripped out from underneath me," Olsen said. "So I was back at square one, like, where am I going to sell my cookies? I need somewhere to sell them."

Olsen then remembered the shack she and her siblings had sold snow cones out of when they were kids.

"It's just been sitting there. And so we did it. And it's a little cute shack here in Idaho Falls, it's in the parking lot of Sexton's car collection," Olsen said after taking a break during the holidays and then taking January off for some mental health time, she'll be at the shack again soon.

"Next Tuesday. So it just kind of depends when I'm there and I make sure to shout it from the rooftops and let everybody know because the times in the days do vary." Olsen says the best way to know when the hours will be is to keep an eye on her Facebook page. "I also take votes on my page and I say, 'Hey, I'm available Thursday this week or Sunday this week. Which day would you guys rather see me there?' And they will tell me, and I'll just go with the majority."

Olsen offers 11 flavors and is always coming up with more.

"I have created 100% by myself, except for my sugar cookie, which is a family recipe," Olsen said. "The very first one that I introduced after my sugar cookie was a Fruity Mama."

The Fruity Mama is a sugar cookie with orange flavoring added to the base. It also has Fruity Pebbles cereal inside and orange icing on top, and has been a best-seller, Olsen said.

She's also unveiling a new flavor.

"It's an oatmeal raisin chocolate chip. It's really yummy," Olsen said that people can't get enough of it. "I did two different rounds. The first round was a dud and I got a lot of suggestions and so I was able to go back, revamp and redo it."

And when it comes to making the custom cookies, it can take eight to nine hours, depending on the difficulty.

"I usually book all of my orders for Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays because most parties are on the weekend," Olsen said, also noting she does have the flexibility to move the days around depending on when the party is. "So I have cookies going out on Friday. I'm going to bake them Thursday, and I will base for them, and then they will need to dry. Frosting will take probably about two hours. Then they need to dry the whole rest of the day and overnight. And then Friday I will do the details. And that's probably what takes the most time is just figuring out the details, making the icing the right consistency, the right colors, and all of that stuff, and then whipping that out in a few hours."

Olsen's icing can also be temperamental.

"My icing is kind of unique. It's not an icing that I've ever seen anybody else use before. A lot of the bakers use royal icing. And I don't use that," Olsen said she doesn't like the flavor of the meringue powder, and instead uses a different kind of icing. "It's just powdered sugar, Karo syrup, and milk, and it's delicious. But I can't always get a super-duper thick buttercream consistency as others. So it's pretty liquid when it starts out. And if I don't let it dry long enough and I pick it up too soon, it wrinkles, kind of shifts, and leaves like a weird wrinkle."

Olsen says she wouldn't be where she is without the support she's gotten from friends, family, and customers. Especially after she had to move back to baking in her home, with her six-quart mixer rather than the industrial mixer at Mrs. Powell's.

"Everybody was so shocked and so heartbroken for me, and didn't know what I was going to do," Olsen said she had posted a video about the situation, and her followers surprised her. "Like three days later one of my followers showed up at my door with like a $1,700 check. And she was like, 'we want you to get a mixer because the number of cookies that you're putting out, it's impossible to do out of a six-quart.' And I didn't have that kind of money to buy that kind of a mixer. So it was just a huge, huge blessing."

Olsen also likes to give blessings of her own, doing random acts of kindness.

"Last year for every single month, we did a random act of kindness," Olsen says acts of kindness are her love language and has always loved doing them. "This has given me the ability to do it on a larger scale."

For example, they took treat baskets over to kitchen staff at area schools.

"We did coffee for cops and got cookies and coffee for the cops. And we provided a bunch of stuff for the Ruth House. And then we're able to provide each of the ladies with a cookie and lotion," Olsen said.

She says doing so makes her a better person.

"It's just made me a better, stronger, more resilient, more determined person," Olsen said. "Just knowing that I have so much at the tip of my fingers and it's such a blessing and it could be wiped from me in any second if I let it, but that I need to stay grounded and know to stay true to who I am. And take the speed bumps as they come because there's always something greater on the other side."

And when it comes to the future, Olsen isn't planning on any big moves.

"I could probably hire people. I could probably do some things and make it a little bit easier for me to get cookies in people's mouths," Olsen said there's one reason why she won't. "What I love about this is that it's me and them. It's me and the customer."

Olsen says she met some of her closest friends through cookies, and because of that, she wants to keep things manageable and focus on quality over quantity.

"I just want to know who I'm making cookies for. To ask how your kids are, I want to know when your birthday is, and I want to know how your husband is. I want that small personal relationship," Olsen said.