If like most people during lockdown, the most you achieved was getting out of your pyjamas by lunchtime some days, you may well feel a bit unaccomplished after what you're about to read. Whilst most of us perhaps harboured ambitions of learning a new language, starting and sticking to a fitness regime, or finally tidying up that miscellaneous drawer in the kitchen, Amy Hutton accidentally set up a business.
Usually to be found at race tracks around the world in her role as Director of Operations at Sport Signage, Amy is responsible for all of the advertising you see around each F1 track. But with the sport on hold due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and enjoying being at home in Oxfordshire for more than a few days snatched between races, she decided to get creative in the kitchen as a way to fill her time instead.
"It was my sister's 11th birthday coming up and I thought, I'll bake her some biscuits and decorate them" says Amy. "I've had the sausage dog biscuit cutter for about two years just sitting in my cupboard, and so I baked them and I thought...actually I'm quite good at this!"
Needless to say, the biscuits were very well received by Amy's sister and family, and it prompted her to order 'a few more' biscuit cutters. "I probably have between three and four hundred now. I went a bit mad..." she says sheepishly.
She put a few pictures of her biscuit creations on her Instagram feed, and they instantly attracted lots of positive comments. "People started to ask if they could order them, and it just kind of happened out of nowhere" Amy explains.
The fledgling business needed a name, but there was really only ever going to be one choice. "I love bumblebees - I've got bumblebee cushions in my house, bumblebee pictures, bumblebee mugs - everything you look at has got a bumblebee on it" laughs Amy. "I needed something easy to remember, and I just looked at one of my cushions and thought 'Bumblebee Biscuit Company' - it just sounded right"
By Amy's own admission, baking biscuits is a far cry from her day job where she is responsible for ensuring that high profile sponsors have the correct branding in the right place around the circuits - something that can change several times before race day on Sunday. "I make sure the team have installed all of the signage correctly, and ensure that the quality is high enough" she explains "There's lots of running around and last minute panicking if something needs changing, trying to find suppliers nearby that can help us out. I'm definitely not as relaxed as I am right now!"
With everything on hold and a rare extended period of time at home, it has been a chance for Amy to reconnect with her artistic streak. "I've always been creative - I studied creative subjects such as art at school and did visual merchandising at college, but for the last five years working in F1, I just haven't been able to do anything with it really" she says. Acknowledging how exhausting the travelling life can be, she adds "I haven't had the time or the energy when I'm at home to do anything like this normally, so I think to know that I've still got it - that all that time has passed and I haven't lost it...that's quite a nice feeling".
The exquisite detail on each biscuit is testament to Amy's eye for detail, but also requires immense concentration and a very steady hand - what's the secret? "I can just about colour in between the lines!" she laughs "I genuinely don't know - I put something on TV or some music on and get myself into the zone , and it just happens".
Designs are wide ranging and Amy is very happy to make bespoke biscuits when requested.
"I recently had an order for Land Rover biscuits, which isn't too unusual but it is very specific! Mermaid tails, Llamas, sausage dogs and designer handbags have all been popular requests. People love the little bumblebees too which are bite size, so I do those in a pack of twelve because they're really tiny" she says.
It's been a tough time for many over these past few months, and Amy felt strongly that her new business should do something positive as well as brightening up people's days.
"All profits have been donated to the NHS throughout lockdown. I'm not making any money from this at the moment, but I'm getting so much out of it" she explains. "I'm lucky to still be working, and it's giving me something personally...it's keeping me going, and it's important to give back isn't it?" she adds. "So many people have struggled with lockdown and I think that if I didn't have this, I probably would've found this time difficult. Having this as my little 'baby' and watching it grow, it's spurred me on to keep doing more of it. It's exciting!"
With the return of F1 in Austria next week, things are about to change and Amy acknowledges that managing her biscuit business alongside her job is going to be difficult.
"Work has really ramped up and so I'm juggling it now" she says "Obviously I won't be able to bake every day now, but I'll definitely have it as my side hustle when I'm back home. It will give me something else to think about in the evenings when I'm away - planning new designs, or ordering new cutters, or icing - something to take my mind off work at the end of the day".
Although she doesn't yet know how it will all work when the relentless cycle of travel begins again, Amy does already have an eye on the future and how The Bumblebee Biscuit Company might evolve."I'd really like to start thinking about hosting biscuit making workshops, probably within the next year or two - I've done flower arranging courses with my Mum as a Mother's Day treat, so maybe I could do a Mother's Day biscuit course. Also children's parties and hen parties - I've got some 'adult' cookie cutters, so as long as I don't mix them up with the children's cutters..." she laughs. Her ultimate goal would be to have a space where people could appreciate the fine art of decorating biscuits in comfort."I would love to have a little shop - a café with a glass kitchen area where you can watch people doing the biscuit making, and then you can sit and have a cup of tea or coffee with a biscuit".
If Amy realises her ambition, one of her first customers may well be a familiar face from the music industry. "Ellie Goulding lives opposite me, and my Dad was doing some maintenance at her house with his company and I told him to take a pack of my biscuits over to her. He did, but she wasn't there so he left them on her doorstep" she says. "He told me not to be too disheartened if she didn't eat them or message me, and then that evening I saw that she'd mentioned me and the biscuits on her Instagram story! It was really nice that she took the time to do it".
Whatever the future holds for Amy and her beautiful biscuits, it's clear that she has gained so much more from this pause in normal proceedings than just satisfied customers. "My working day is long on track, and I'm always with different people having different conversations about different projects, so this has been the total opposite and I think that's why I've liked it so much, because it's given me time to...focus on me a bit, and just have time to breathe".
