She baked oatmeal, and only oatmeal, cookies for a decade. Now Tacoma baker closes shop

Only Oatmeal Cookies Creations, which served Tacoma from farmers markets for almost a decade before opening a stall at the Waterfront Market in Ruston, closed permanently Jan. 1.

While the bottom line was a factor, it was largely a personal decision, owner Karina Blasco told The News Tribune in a recent phone call.

“The letting go — it’s more of a not forcing it,” she said. “Around September, I could see the writing on the wall as far as where things were going, and I had made a decision then: I’m not going to feed money into this business.”

Since launching Only Oatmeal formally in 2011, after baking for friends and family for 10 years prior, Blasco had avoided taking out loans and focused instead on grassroots growth. Not a baker by nature, she harnessed her background in accounting to build a “business in a box,” a concept that anyone could pop in and take over. Early on, she dreamed of having a retail shop inside a public marketplace.

That opportunity arrived in 2019.

Only Oatmeal was one of a handful of anchor tenants at what is now the Waterfront Market in Ruston. Blasco designed the layout of the shop’s 400-square-foot branded unit, baking cookies from-scratch on-site with add-ins like peanut butter chips, toffee and almonds — never raisins.

The closure is the second such loss for the market, which changed hands in 2021 when the Point Ruston development group got snarled in lawsuits over failure to pay contractors. Dancing Goats Coffee pulled the plug at the end of 2021. (The Olympia-based roaster has a full-service cafe at the Brewery Blocks in downtown Tacoma.)

Serpanok Inc. now owns and operates the Waterfront Market.

Blasco hopes to sell all of her equipment and fixtures to the venue, where manager Paul Kunitsa said he is “working through several possibilities for the space, but it will definitely be a food and/or dessert booth.”

He praised Blasco for bringing her enthusiasm to the market.

“I’m thankful for the opportunity to get to know her and her family, and to work with her,” he said in a message. “I wish her the best of luck as she moves on to the next chapter, and hope she visits often.”

Announcing the closure on social media, Blasco described Only Oatmeal’s origins in 2003 as a passion project for a mother of two small children.

“Only Oatmeal gave me a sense of purpose, something to dream about and reach towards outside the everyday hard life of raising a family,” she wrote. “Only Oatmeal is complete, it has served its purpose and all signs lead to letting go.”

The business was never an income-generator, she admitted, and her priority was always her family. Reaching her 40s — “let me tell you!” she laughed — “also began to just stir up this life thing for me as far as where you are, who you are, what you’ve done and where you’re going.”

As is the case for just about every small business today, staffing posed challenges. She only recently figured out that magical number of how many people she needed (about 6) to operate efficiently without sacrificing quality of product, or of life.

“I’m proud of myself,” she said. “I feel a sense of completion.”

She’s not yet sure what she’ll do next, though returning to the corporate world — she worked for Capital One before jumping fully into Only Oatmeal and simultaneous parenthood — is unlikely. Last year, she launched the Black Business Market, which she plans to nurture.

Speaking to her experience at the Waterfront Market, where foot traffic has reportedly been slow on weekdays if busy on weekends, she hopes more upstart brands take advantage of the opportunity to work alongside other entrepreneurs.

“I don’t have any regrets about being at the market,” she said. “I probably wouldn’t have lasted a year if I wasn’t there. I’m sure there are new retail businesses that would love to see 50 people come through their door on a Wednesday, and I can’t attribute that to Only Oatmeal — I can attribute that to this joint space, where we’re sharing customers. There’s marketing happening on your behalf. I’m thankful for the market. I think more businesses should explore the possibility.”

This story was originally published January 7, 2023 at 7:00 AM.