Cookies by Design to Return in a New Form
August 11, 2025
• Kai Moreto, the baker behind Elite Dough Cookies, is opening a brick-and-mortar in the same Needham Heights space where he once operated Cookies by Design.
Cookie lovers, rejoice. The vacant storefront at 54 Highland Ave., previously home to Cookies by Design, will once again be filled with familiar offerings and aromas.
After leaving the franchise and starting his own food truck called Elite Dough Cookies, Kai Moreto decided to bring his “jumbo cookies” back to Needham, where he worked for five years. Moreto spent about a year testing out recipes before opening his food truck in May.
Moreto said he plans to open his shop this fall — and the food truck is not going away.
In an interview with Needham Local, Moreto shared his love for entrepreneurship, social media and finding old and new customers.
How did you start in the cookie business?
“My story’s a little bit unconventional. Sometimes you have to take opportunities that come up. I used to own a franchise, it was called Cookies by Design, and it was basically sugar cookie bouquets and decorated sugar cookies. I worked with the franchise for about five years.
But during that time, I was able to grow a very large social media platform, which took off from doing a lot of behind the scenes stuff, with baking, things like that.
I couldn’t really take advantage of the audience I had with the product that I had. Each [Cookies by Design] location has its own zone, so I was only able to sell in my own zone, and a lot of the people who are following me are from everywhere, really, around the world, but a lot of it in the United States. So I needed to create a product where I can monetize and ship nationwide. That’s where the idea for creating these jumbo cookies came from.”
Where did the food truck business start, and how is it going?
“At first it was only an online offering, but it started growing to the point where I needed to make a decision, because at this time, I was still under contract with Cookies by Design, which was franchised, and they were taking a percentage of the franchise fee out of what I was selling as well. So all the cookies that I was selling, they were still making a profit off of it, even though they had nothing to do with it. So it came down to what I wanted to do and [whether to] close down the franchise, and that’s what I decided to do.”
It’s hard. You only make money if you’re out there vending, and finding spots is not as easy as seems. I never thought it was easy, but it’s a lot of work, and I don’t have a really big team in a really big space, because we’re in a shared kitchen space now. So that’s kind of where we are now. The business is growing to the point where I need more space, and that’s where we are with opening the shop at Needham.”
Why Needham?
“The cookie shop that I had before was in Needham. So I’m familiar with the area. And believe it or not, I’m actually looking at the same store. So the store we closed, it’s been a few months since that happened, we closed up in May, but it’s still vacant. So I spoke to the new owners… and we worked out a deal.
Ultimately, I thought I already built such a large following in Boston locally that I wanted to stay as close as possible to Boston, where my shop would be easier to get to, so that’s where we are here. Needham is a really wealthy location, and when opening up a business, especially one like mine, where it’s not a necessity, it’s a luxury, you have to make sure you’re around people with disposable income, and that kind of made my decision.”
How do Cookies by Design cookies differ from Elite Dough Cookies?
“Cookies by Design is more of a gifting company. What we did was we decorated sugar cookies and we designed it to a specific thing. So if it was like a birthday or newborn baby, along those lines, we would decorate whatever the customer had in mind. We would get great cookies in that scene, which is completely different from what I’m doing now, which is more of a dessert shop.
The type of cookies I’m doing, if you’re in the baking industry, it’s called a New York style cookie. They’re thick, they’re six ounces, they’re crispy on the outside and gooey on the inside.
Mine, everything is all natural. It’s premium quality ingredients.”
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Why are you in the cookie-making business?
“It’s not necessarily the cookie process that I love. I’m more of an entrepreneur — Entrepreneur first, baker second. I think just my entrepreneurial style made me fall in love with the baking process.
I know that the better I make cookies, the happier I make the customers.
When I compare to Crumbl [Cookies], I definitely study what they do, and their model has worked very, very well, very, very fast. That’s kind of where I am, as far as why I do what I do. It’s more trying to build a brand, knowing the social media side of things, and jumping on what they’re doing.
I’m staying in my own lane, of course… Instagram and social media, there’s a lot of happy highlights, and a lot of people don’t always show the tough parts of the business, so I like to show it all. I like showing the good stuff, but I also like to document the losses and the hard times.”
How does it feel returning to your old stomping grounds?
“At first I had a little bit of a bad taste. Closing out a shop that you worked so hard to work with — I wanted to start new, start fresh somewhere else, but I also have a large following here. When I started to introduce the cookies at the [Needham] shop, people were really enjoying it.
When I took over the shop, I just bought a shop that was already functional. I just bought the franchise shop as is, so it didn’t really feel like you were starting something new. I feel like now I’m very, very excited. [This will] be 100% mine, I built it from the ground up, and I’m renovating from outside to inside. And I get to really build and focus 100% on my customers and bring that back to Needham.”
What comes next?
“I have to renovate all of the shop, so everything I do inside the shop, you need to get permits for working with the [town]. That’s going to be my next couple of months, really trying to move the ball along as fast as possible, just because it’s tough permitting.
In the shop, we’re paying rent, so the faster I can get open, the better. But also we don’t want to rush the process and make sure I do the grand opening.”
What can people expect?
“We’re technically going to work through a ‘food truck’ inside the shop, so it’ll bring a nice little atmosphere. People can bring their kids, and it’s not just the cookie shop. It’s more of an experience versus just the cookies.
We’re not just cookies. Cookies are in the name, but we’ll do cookie milkshake, cookie sundaes, serving cookies warm with ice cream. We’re going to have cookie coffee, cookie lattes, hot chocolate.
We already do shipping nationwide, so we have the boxes for the gift packages and gift boxes and things like that. And we’re obviously going to work a lot on catering and things like that. So, it’s not just a cookie shop where you come in and pick up cookies.
It’s a one-stop shop for basically anything cookies, basically.”
Moreto’s responses have been slightly edited for clarity and brevity.
