Julie Goodnight’s customers and employees, when they heard she was named Career Woman of the Year, had almost the same response: It’s about time.
Goodnight, 47, of Greenbrier is owner of Julie’s Sweet Shoppe & Bakery in Conway. She’s been working in the bakery business for 30 years — since she was 17.
The Conway Business and Professional Women presented Goodnight with the award last week at the group’s first Ladies in Red event.
“It’s an honor, and I don’t like talking about myself,” Goodnight said. “I don’t like being in the spotlight; I just want to blend in with everybody.”
Goodnight grew up in Conway and graduated from St. Joseph High School. Her father, Ed Bradley, opened Ed’s Bakery in 1986, although it is no longer in the family. Goodnight and her sister, Susie Wallace of Greenbrier, were expected to work in the store.
“We were just generally waiting on customers and helping my dad with all aspects [of the bakery],” she said. By the time she was 18, Goodnight was doing payroll for the business.
It was a lot for a teenager to handle, and she didn’t think it was her life’s calling, Goodnight said. She went to Pulaski County Vocational Technical College and got a certificate in accounting.
“I went and applied at a bank, thinking, ‘I’m not going to do this my whole life,’” she said of the bakery business.
Goodnight didn’t get the bank job.
“The Lord was leading me in another direction,” she said.
Her grandmother, Margie Bradley, was an employee at a former Little Rock bakery, which is where Goodnight’s father worked when he was growing up.
Goodnight ultimately co-owned Ed’s Bakery for many years until she branched out on her own. She opened her own business on Skyline Drive in the Conway Towne Centre on Veterans Day,
Nov. 11, 2013. Her silent partner is Tim Tyler of Greenbrier.
“He is awesome; he lets me do what I want to do, no questions asked,” Goodnight said.
She purposely picked Veterans Day to open.
“Whether we sold anything or not, we didn’t care — it was for the veterans,” she said.
Goodnight said many of the veterans who had met at the previous bakery each morning to drink coffee, eat breakfast and solve the world’s problems followed her to Julie’s Sweet Shoppe & Bakery, she said.
Both her grandfathers were World War II veterans, “and we didn’t know their stories; they never talked about it,” she said.
Julie started putting together a book for her customers who served in the military to present to them during a Veterans Day celebration, a tradition she started at Ed’s Bakery.
“It has pictures of all the veterans and tells their stories,” she said. “They fill it out in their handwriting.”
She flipped through the bound book, and stopped and pointed to one veteran, who has since died. He was aboard a ship that sank, and he wrote that he “lived on a life raft for three days.”
On the back cover of the books, she lists names of veterans who have died in the past year.
“That list just keeps growing,” she said, and her eyes filled with tears.
This Veterans Day will be her third anniversary in her business. She said about 150 people attend the celebration, and volunteers bring golf carts to drive veterans to the door. She provides free coffee and snacks and gives away door prizes, thanks to donations from other businesses and individuals.
“It’s a way of giving back and honoring [veterans] because they deserve it. They love it,” she said.
Korean War veteran Jim Mauldin of Damascus was sitting at a table with a group of regulars in her bakery one morning. He said he comes to the shop just about every day. Truth be told, he sometimes shows up twice a day, Goodnight said.
“She stays up to date on all the veterans,” he said.
Goodnight said her favorite part of the business is interacting with her customers.
“To me, because I like to work and I love people, the challenge is balancing being an owner and taking care of paperwork and being where I can still visit with people. I crave that — I want to see the customers who come in here and visit with them,” she said.
Customers — who are more like a fan club — are eager to talk about Goodnight.
Maryon Wood and a friend, Ellen Griffin, both of Conway, sat at a round table that had been full earlier in the morning.
When they heard that Goodnight was nominated for the Career Woman of the Year award, which at that point Goodnight didn’t know she’d won, they were excited.
“She deserves that!” Wood said. “She takes such good care of us; she really waits on us. She knows our birthdays. We just love her.”
“She knows our names,” said customer Paul Reed of Conway.
Griffin said she and her husband, Norman, usually come to the bakery three days a week. “We eat breakfast, and we just have fellowship.”
Julie said she’s picky about what she serves her customers.
“I only want to have the best of the best,” she said.
The reason she chose Tiffany’s blue for her logo color is, “to me, when you look at the Tiffany’s box, you know it has the best of the best inside.”
For example, “my chocolate-gravy recipe is my mother-in-law’s,” Goodnight said. Customers also make suggestions for treats, and she’ll add them to the menu.
Here’s a plot twist: “Honestly, I’m not into doing a lot of baking. That’s what I have bakers for,” Goodnight said. “I love decorating.” She’s been honing her decorating skills since she was 19, and wedding cakes are her specialty.
“I’m a working owner,” Goodnight said. She gets to the bakery between 3:30 and 4 a.m. Monday through Thursday, but she leaves in the afternoon to pick up her pride and joy, her 8-month-old granddaughter, Doreen.
“I live here on the weekends,”
she said. If someone peeked in the business on Friday nights, they might see her catching a quick nap on the mattress she keeps tucked away.
Cathy Goodnight of Conway, one of her sisters-in-law, has been with Goodnight since she opened and helped her manage the morning rush.
“We called her to help me clean, and she has not left this shop since, seriously,” Julie said.
Julie also has a group of about five men she calls her “bakery dads.”
“I can count on them for anything,” she said. When she was working to open her business, they were there helping her clean.
Julie’s father also helps out by making fruit cakes during the holidays, and her nieces can be counted on to help dip strawberries in chocolate for Valentine’s Day. Julie said her husband, Larry, who has a construction business, has always been supportive. He worked at Ed’s Bakery with her after he graduated from high school, before they were even married.
Goodnight has about 20 part- and full-time employees. Manager Mary Rose Rappold, who has worked with Goodnight for about seven years, said she is more like an aunt than a boss.
“She’d do anything for us,” Rappold said. “She’s here all the time. Even when she’s home, she’s working.”
Rappold was happy to hear about Goodnight’s honor. “I think it’s awesome — it’s about time,” Rappold said.
Goodnight said she doesn’t regret devoting her life to the bakery business.
“I absolutely love it,” she said. “Yes, you have your good times and bad times, but I’d experienced so much; I knew a lot of the path I could take, the connections.”
She said supporting the community is important to her, and that means saying “yes” a lot.
“I’m a customer-pleaser because I always think, ‘What if I were the customer?’”
Goodnight said she donates sweets to several groups and organizations, including the Conway Human Development Center’s events, the Girl Scouts, the American Cancer Society, Circle of Friends and New Life Church, of which she is a member. She works with Help for Abuse Victims in Emergency Need each year, a residential home in Conway for girls who have been abused and neglected. After pictures with Santa, the HAVEN
girls get to decorate gingerbread houses, and Goodnight buys gifts for them with money donated for the event.
She said she doesn’t take her customers for granted.
“My father used to always say, ‘These people do not have to come in here; it’s not a necessity.’”
One of Goodnight’s customers, Kerry Stitch of Conway, nominated her for the Career Woman of the Year award. Stitch’s father, World War II veteran Bill Pate, is also one of Goodnight’s customers.
In the nomination letter, Stitch mentioned Goodnight’s annual standing-room-only Veterans Day celebration. Stitch wrote that Goodnight “sees beyond her product and profit, which is sometimes missing in the culture we find ourselves in today. Julie understands and fosters a sense of community inside her business, one that enables folks — especially retirees — to meet, visit, feel connected and to be cared for in a very personal way.”
It’s what Goodnight’s done her whole life, and why she has risen to the top.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.