A Goldman Sachs employee who gained a following online as an “investment baker” has left Wall Street, citing constant scrutiny from the firm’s compliance team as a factor in her decision to pursue baking full-time last year.
Alison Sheehan, 27, shared with Fortune that compliance officers at Goldman were concerned about her use of the term “investment” in her social media accounts and insisted that she take down posts about her baking endeavors while working as an asset manager.
Sheehan, who began her four-year journey at Goldman in 2021, would wake up at 5 a.m. to create intricate cakes, documenting the process on social media.
She mentioned that her side hustle was picking up steam. She had clients such as Gope, Valentino, Love Shack Fancy, Brooke Shields, and Gigi Hadid.
“I didn’t think there was anything wrong with what I was doing,” she told the magazine.
Her colleagues seemed to really support her baking passion. “They love it so much and they’re always asking, ‘Alison, what did you make this morning? Show me! Can you bring it over?'” she recounted.
Initially, Sheehan took down her posts as requested by the company but later restored them because she wanted to highlight her entrepreneurial skills while applying to the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
However, the compliance team reached out to her again months later.
After this second encounter, Sheehan decided it was time to leave Goldman and focus on expanding her baking business.
“I was sitting at my desk doing some boring real estate planning, and I got fed up with about 90 percent of the orders being rejected,” she recalled. “I just wanted to make bread.”
Her journey into entrepreneurship had begun while she was a student at Southern Methodist University’s Cox School of Business in Dallas, where she started selling cakes to sorority sisters for around $100 each. That small venture grew quickly.
Despite the early success in baking, Sheehan opted for a finance career and accepted a job at Goldman right after graduation.
She first worked in equity trading in the Salt Lake City office before moving to New York in 2022.
In Manhattan, she revitalized her baking Instagram account and started sharing her experiences of balancing both banking and baking.
Her business grew significantly through word of mouth.
As the demand for her cakes increased, she rented commercial kitchen space on the Lower East Side to keep up.
After departing from Goldman, she dedicated herself entirely to her baking business.
Since then, her cake production has surged by about 300 percent. She now makes between 10 to 30 desserts a week, from small treats to elaborate wedding cakes.
However, without Wall Street’s salary, Sheehan had to get inventive. She traded dog-walking services with a neighbor in exchange for daytime access to their kitchen.
Having left Wall Street, Sheehan has ramped up her production even further. She is currently working on a broader consumer products line under Alleycat Baking Co. while also pursuing her MBA at Northwestern University.
“We could open a storefront, we could open a bakery, maybe we could be the next SusieCakes or Baked by Melissa,” she noted. “Alternatively, launching in retail with baking mixes and frostings could also be an option.”
The Post attempted to contact both Goldman and Sheehan for comments.
