Paul Bradford is a baker and groundbreaking entrepreneur best known for co-founding Cakeflix, an online education program that offers tutorials on how to bake and decorate cakes. Riding the wave of interest in baking generated by major shows such as The Great British Bake Off, Cakeflix has become a great success. Bradford is the head of the program’s 75 tutors and is a highly-regarded award-winning baker. The greatest honour he has received to date is being inducted as a Disciple D’Escoffier (a distinguished French-based culinary order). He has also won several diverse business awards, including VOWS Wedding Supplier of the Year, Cake Masters Best Learning Experience, and Shellwire Business of the Year Award for Use of Technology.
Bradford’s love of baking is lifelong. As a child, he would help his gran with baking at the weekend, decorating the cakes she baked. By the age of 17, he was being awarded notable cake decorating prizes such as the Scothot Silver Award. After leaving college, he worked in a bakery in his native Scotland but, by the age of 23, had opened his first High Street bakers. He made a small, but significant, piece of history in 2003, when his shop became the first to allow customers to order, customise, and pay for their cake online — something that is standard procedure today.
By the time Bradford sold his business in 2011, it had expanded to seven shops employing 35 people. He used the money to realise his passion for education and set up Cakeflix, which has gone from strength to strength ever since.