The Cheesecake Lady in Elkins Park was recently mentioned by PhillyBite Magazine, an article which adds to the long list of coverage by major outlets over the years.
In July 2020, The Philadelphia Inquirer published “The Cheesecake Lady has customers lining up in Elkins Park“. The article describes how owner Vanessa Jackson, now 57, went from selling homemade slices for $3 after church to owning a popular dessert destination that she operates with her daughters:
In her first career, Jackson was director of development for Bethel Deliverance International Church in Cheltenham and assistant director of development of the annual fund at Arcadia University, from which she has a business degree.
But it wasn’t until 2013 that she made moves to open a storefront. Her friend and Zumba instructor, Torri Grice, owned Kazoodles pet boutique in Jenkintown. Grice had a good relationship with other retailers and landlords in the area, and she started looking for a space for Jackson.She found one on West Avenue, a busy strip filled with mom-and-pop shops and restaurants close to Route 611. Jackson opened up there in January 2014, and business took off seamlessly as her longtime customers combined with a loyal local following.
One month later, the “viral” cheesecakes made it all the way to Chicago in a feature by ABC7:
Last year, Bob Kelly of FOX29 featured the store as part of its “Kelly Drives” sequence:
A few weeks later, PHL17 gave the store the headline “Elkins Park’s viral cheesecakes at The Cheesecake Lady”:
From their article:
Originally producing full size 9″ cakes in the Jenkintown location, Vanessa and her team decided they needed to make some changes in order to increase productivity. They moved to their current location in Elkins Park where they now produce over 50 different flavors of their miniature cheesecakes. Brittany tells us that the miniature cakes not only allow them to keep up with the demand they see everyday, but they also allow customers to try more than one flavor at a time.
Jackson opened the Elkins Park store in 2018 after moving it from Jenkintown. From the Cheesecake Lady’s “About Us” section of their website:
It’s really funny how The Cheesecake Lady got its start because I never tasted cheesecake until I was 34 years old. The very thought of cheese in a cake was reprehensible in my mind (silly me)! … I use only the finest, freshest ingredients for our cakes. And, because I am a foodie, who loves to cook and loves to see people enjoy good food as much as I do, I bake each cake with love and passion. I invite you to “TASTE THE LOVE!”
The Cheesecake Lady is open Thursday to Sunday from 10:00am to 3:00pm or until its supplies run out. For more on the store, which is located at 910 Township Line Road, you can visit their Facebook page and website.
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