June 25, 2021

When 24-year-old Ryanna Sandoval started her business selling decorated chocolate-covered strawberries, she was a new mom using berry decorating as an outlet to manage her postpartum depression.

Now, she has a toddler who needs her attention more than her business, Lili Berries, named after that same toddler.

Sandoval announced this week that she’ll be closing Lili Berries. Customers can still place and pick up orders through June 30.

“The strawberry business, it’s wonderful,” Sandoval said. “It’s great, but it’s just not really helping me as much as I wanted it to.”

Decorating berries started out as a therapeutic hobby, but when she switched to opening the business in January, she realized the margins were tight.

By the time she’d purchased the ingredients, molds, food coloring, sprinkles, etc., it just wasn’t sustainable.

That’s not to say the business didn’t help.

Her customers showed up in droves recently when she needed to raise money to go visit her dying grandmother, and Sandoval said she’s grateful for all the people she has met and the support she has received.

She may someday make and sell the chocolate-covered berries again in the future, she said, but she’s looking to make a career move and go back to school for dentistry. That also may involve a move closer to her hometown in New Mexico, she said.

“I’m very grateful for (my customers),” she said. “Without their support, Lili Berries wouldn’t have gotten as far as it did.”