28-03-2025
Tacoma's biscotti maven bids farewell after 13 years, says it's ‘been an awesome ride'
The Art of Crunch, which supplied Tacoma-area coffee shops and restaurants with homemade biscotti, brownies, bars, crackers and more, has closed after 13 years.
Owner Rhonda Hamlin delivered her last batch of goodies to customers, including Curran Coffee in Old Town and Two Fox Winery in Lakebay, this week. They wanted to stock up, she said, and that commitment 'means so much, because you know it's just supporting each other locally.'
Informing her wholesale clients was, she added, one of the most challenging parts of shutting down the business she started as a single mom to two now-grown kids in 2012. It also elongated the process of shutting down, as she began thinking about it seriously last fall.
'I'd get frustrated and tried to think of what in the world I would even want to do,' she reflected in a phone call with The News Tribune.
Outside of juggling prior jobs through the first couple of years, she was baking full-time by 2014, growing to employ four people. After struggling to find the right space to have her own brick-and-mortar with an equipped commercial kitchen, she found The Gourmet Niche at 7104 6th Ave., a commissary owned by chef and caterer Bette Anne Curry.
'That part has been great,' said Hamlin, noting its flexibility, cost, mentorship and access to advice from fellow food entrepreneurs.
She went into business after perfecting a biscotti recipe that, years prior, earned her a blue-ribbon in a baking contest at the Washington State Fair. The winner: cranberry biscotti dipped in white chocolate. Flavors have touched on the likes of lavender-caramel, ginger-lemon and tiramisu, according to a 2017 feature in The News Tribune. At the time, she had a tent at the Proctor Farmers Market, too. She also made specialties hard to find locally such as Nanaimo bars, a Canadian chocolate and custard wafer of sorts.
Lately, other vendors have included Coffeezaun on Pearl in the North End, Wide Awake Cafe (which recently opened a third location on Ruston Way), Delightful Neighborhood Market, Happy Belly and Sandwich Starr.
As the pandemic impacted her clients, she tried her hand at her own retail storefront at The Gourmet Niche, with a boost from neighbor Wildside Wine. That helped alleviate some of the residual financial struggles, but she was careful not to undercut her loyal clients and hesitated to raise prices. They were already paying a premium to support a small brand over a processed good from Costco or other commercial suppliers, she noted.
'It's hard being a small wholesaler,' she explained, adding that the profit margin is smaller than selling direct-to-consumer. 'I didn't have the cash flow to buy a lot in bulk nor anywhere to store it. I go all over the place for certain things.'
She felt OK coming out of 2020 and 2021, but lately, everything was just adding up — or rather, not so much.
'It just wasn't enough,' she continued. 'The cost of ingredients and minimum wage, taxes, licensing — you just name it, everything's going up.'
What was for more than a decade a way to make a living felt increasingly impractical, she said, especially as she headed into her early 60s.
'I just got tired of fighting it, that's all,' Hamlin said.
Before starting The Art of Crunch, she worked at Nordstrom and will, in a sense, return to retail — this time at Metropolitan Market.
Serving Tacoma for 13 years has 'been an awesome ride,' she said, but she hopes locals take a closer look at the small businesses that surround them.
'There are so many hats to wear behind the scenes,' she said. 'I just think it would challenge people to really pay attention to small businesses you really like but maybe don't go to a lot. I've had people come to me and say, 'Oh my gosh, I should have come to you more often.' That little place over there? You need more people to go that place instead of Walmart or Target or whatever. Just a few extra pennies at the small place would certainly help a lot.'
