Six years ago, Amy Mucha was working as a teacher. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she developed a love for making and decorating cake pops. She never imagined she would own a cake pop studio, create a small manufacturing operation, organize a cake pop conference for bakers nationwide, or win a pitch competition like Chain Reaction.

Since pursuing her cake pop curiosity full-time, she’s learned anything is “popsible.”

“I am so glad I followed the call to cake pop full-time, and here we are,” Amy says while sitting in the Daisy Pops bakery in downtown Kent.

Amy won first place in Season 8 of Cleveland Chain Reaction, COSE’s annual pitch competition for small businesses. She received $40,000, which she used to launch the newest component of her Daisy Makes operation: frozen cake pop dough.

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Professional and first-time cake poppers from anywhere in the country can purchase cake pop molds, sticks, baggies, and now, frozen cake pop dough. She and a small but mighty team work every day from their Kent headquarters to fill orders for the expanding business – using 3D printers to build the molds for unique cake pop creations and new freezers purchased with the Chain Reaction prize money to store the frozen, pre-measured dough.

“A big part of what I want Daisy Makes to be is a one-stop pop shop,” Amy explains.

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On top of running the manufacturing business and her cake pop bakery, Amy welcomes cake poppers from around the globe to Greater Cleveland for her cake pop convention, “What’s Poppin Con.” While there are vendors and sweets galore, the convention focuses mainly on what it takes to run a small business, something she is grateful to keep learning herself from competitions like Chain Reaction.

“I had never learned how to pitch. So, Chain Reaction was so helpful because we also went through those classes, and it’s like, this is how you pitch. And I was like, ‘Oh – that’s how you do it’,” she says.

Chain Reaction Season 9 applications are now open through May 30. Small businesses selected for this year’s program will participate in a business bootcamp hosted by JumpStart for four weeks, where they will learn to pitch and sell their business. Semifinalists for the year will be chosen at the beginning of June and move on to the pitch competition portion of the program. The finale to choose the top three winners is hosted live on Fox 8 News in the Morning at the end of July.

Chain Reaction Season 9 applications are now open through May 30. Semifinalists will be announced in June and will participate in a four-week bootcamp hosted by JumpStart where business experts will help them prepare to pitch to a panel of judges. The finale to announce the top three winners is hosted live on Kickin’ it with Kenny during Fox 8 News in the Morning at the end of July. Learn more and apply here.