Meet Senate Pignato

We had the good fortune of connecting with Senate Pignato and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Senate, how does your business help the community?
I volunteer my time to make, bake, package and deliver my cookies and 100% of the profits get donated to local Palm Beach County charities that benefit military veterans. My motto is, benefitting veterans with every batch.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
Starting this business I’ve learned so much along the way. I’m a 15 year old high school student so I had to figure everything out from the ground up. Riding home from school one day I told my mom I wanted to figure out a way to raise money to support local veterans in a tangible way. After a bit of brainstorming she offered me her cookie recipe so that I could sell cookies to make a profit that would be then be donated to a couple of charities that I did a lot of research on. Then it came to thinking of a name and seeing how I was a cadet in the Jupiter High School JROTC program, I decided on Cadet Cookies. I then had to bake up a batch of my mom’s cookies learning how she measured everything and mixed it all in a particular order and figured out how many cookies each batch could consistently produce. We then headed off to Costco and priced all the bulk ingredients, entered them into an app that helps figure out the price of each ingredient per cookie and factored that bit into pricing. My dad, who is a graphic designer helped me create my logo and website and over all helped me land my branding message. After filing and receiving my LLC, I opened a business banking account, an Amazon business account, ordered some packaging, and sourced professional labels. From there my mom and I created and Instagram account and that’s how we began promoting Cadet Cookies. I set a goal of raising $2000 in a year to donate to local military charities. I’m excited to say that I met my goal within 55 days of business. The first $1000 was donated to the Friends of Fisher House in West Palm Beach and the second $1000 was donated to the Wounded Veterans Relief Fund in North Palm Beach. I personally researched and vetted both organizations and visited prior to making the donations. I was very impressed with the work the do with veterans to make sure they are supported and not forgotten. Sometimes I have long days with school, marksmanship practice, homework and baking to fulfill orders, but when I get to donate the money it all becomes worth the effort.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
On my spare time I really enjoy going kayaking at Riverbend Park in Jupiter and stoping by their Magic Bowl food truck when I’m done to order a custom acai bowl. It’s a great way to check out the local wildlife and support another small business. I also like going to Paddy Mac’s in Palm Beach Gardens. They are an authentic Irish pub that makes a killer shepherd’s pie and bread pudding for dessert. Other than that, I will head out with my parents to Okeechobee Shooting Sports and do some skeet shooting for the day and end with lunch at Crackers a nice local diner.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I recognize that the freedoms I’ve been given are a direct result of the sacrifices made by our military. My parents, Andrew and Rachel Pignato, raised me to always respect the military and do what I could to honor them. Then in middle school I took a class called America at War. My teacher Mr. Battle really helped to develop my passion for our veterans by showing what they went through both to protect our country and their continued struggles when they came back to civilian life. Ever since then I had a passion to do whatever I could to support the men and women who I consider to be heroes.

Website: www.cadetcookies.com

Instagram: cadet_cookies

Other: Email: info@cadetcookies.com