A former banker opened a Levain-style cookie shop in Singapore
Donovan Wong, a former bank account manager, opened the Ate Cookies kiosk at Singapore’s Golden Mile Food Centre, where he sells large cookies inspired by those from New York’s Levain Bakery. According to Channel NewsAsia, the 33-year-old entrepreneur invested about 40,000 Singapore dollars in the new project.
Ate Cookies opened on June 14 and became Wong’s second outlet in this food center. Since 2021, he has also been handling administrative work, finances, marketing, and human resources for the Taiwanese food stall Wen Li Taiwanese Food. His business partner at that establishment works as a chef.
Before entering the food service industry, Wong worked in the banking sector for a little over two years. He said that in five years, his income from the restaurant business has not yet exceeded his salary as a banker, but he has no regrets about changing careers. The experience of a failed attempt to expand his first restaurant, he said, made him more cautious: he spent over a year looking for a location with an affordable rent.
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Wong had no baking experience before launching Ate Cookies. He says the idea came to him after he tasted Subway cookies and wanted to create a thicker, more flavorful version. He studied Levain Bakery’s products through videos and photos, without tasting the original, and later developed his own version tailored to local tastes.
The kiosk offers four types of cookies weighing between 180 and 200 grams. Cookies with walnuts and dark chocolate, oatmeal with raisins, as well as matcha, macadamia, and white chocolate cookies cost 5.50 Singapore dollars each. Chocolate cookies with a soft center are sold for 7 Singapore dollars.
Wong bakes and sells about 60–70 cookies every day. He acknowledges that the price of a single cookie may be equivalent to the cost of a meal at a food center, but explains that this is due to the size of the cookies and the use of nuts, couverture chocolate, matcha, and cocoa.
