Greatly influenced by her mother, Dorine, Marie Stephens first earned a Bachelor of Science in early childhood education from East Central University in 1993 and went on to serve as an elementary school teacher in Oklahoma, Alaska and Kansas between 1994 and 2011. While in Alaska, she spent four years as a teacher, coach, lifeguard, reading specialist and after-school program director for the local Inupiat Inuit community. During her tenure in education, she cultivated significant expertise in marketing and business through her work as manager and owner of Vested Ventures Ltd, a subsidiary of Vested LLC, in North Carolina from 2005 to 2007 and as the business manager for Cedars Lodge in Ketchikan, Alaska, during the fishing season of 2006. In 2011, Ms. Stephens established her two businesses, Bake My Day LLC and a Nothing Bundt Cakes franchise in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
The owner and operator of Bake My Day and Nothing Bundt Cakes, Ms. Stephens attributes much of her success to her ability to makes connections with others. She also sat on the brand advisory council for Nothing Bundt Cakes Enterprise in 2017 and 2019 and is proud to have helped to build the company’s brand as well a loyal customer base. Since the inception of her businesses, she has continued to cultivate her professional skills through continued education programs from SkillPath. Most recently, she completed a course titled, Supervisor’s Guide to Giving Directions, Feedback and Criticism, in 2021. The most important thing Ms. Stephens has learned throughout her career is that learning is a process and that every little thing she has learned has built up to her current level of knowledge, which will continue to grow as she learns more.
Due to her skill in understanding both people and company demands, Ms. Stephens established Dare to Develop Consulting in 2021, where she serves as the principal consultant as well as a professional speaker and coach to help other entrepreneurs excel. She has proffered her expertise as a speaker for the School of Management and Marketing at Western Illinois University, Bixby High School, the Tulsa Wedding Merchants Group, and the Girl Scouts of Eastern Oklahoma, among others. An active member of the Bixby Metro Chamber of Commerce and the Edmond Area Chamber of Commerce, Ms. Stephens has also contributed her skills in various roles with Executive Women International, the Tulsa Executives Association, The Alternative Board and more.
For her excellence, Ms. Stephens and her businesses have been featured in a wide range of magazines, including TulsaKids Magazine, Yukon Progress, and the Tulsa World, and on several news channels as well. Notably, she was featured in the article, “Tulsa Women in Business,” by Tulsa People Magazine in 2021 and, that same year, was nominated as an Influential Businesswoman. Previous accolades of hers include the A-List Reader’s Choice Award from the city of Tulsa, Oklahoma, from 2020-2021, the Impact Partnership Award from Youth for Christ in 2019, and a nomination for Bakery of the Year with Nothing Bundt Cakes Enterprise in 2017. Ms. Stephens has also recently been nominated for the position of president for the Tulsa Executives Association.
Above everything, Ms. Stephens hopes to leave a legacy as someone who was caring, genuine and who strives to keep peoples’ best interest at heart. She would advise young and aspiring professionals that the best things they can do for their future careers are to ask questions and take risks, and that they should view failure as a necessary step toward success. In her free time, Ms. Stephens enjoys classical piano, both listening to and playing, and she has eight years of experience playing piano.
