By Kathleen Berger, Executive Producer of Science and Technology

Ismael Wayne is the owner of Puddin Puddin. When Wayne lost his job, he said he had to make money somehow.

“I had gotten laid off from my job a month before I got married,” he explained.

So, he turned to his very own recipe of homemade banana pudding! Wayne decided to use his talents to solve a temporary financial situation and is amazed at how it turned into a growing business that he named, Puddin Puddin.

Wayne said he was always hustling products or services while growing up, starting in grade school through his college years.

“I knew how to hustle since 2nd grade, selling (store bought) Oatmeal Creme Pies to students.”

He said he’s always been good at hustling, but hustling his banana pudding and many flavors of specialized pudding cheesecakes are quickly having a level of success he never imagined.

“It was definitely something I was never expecting to hustle, because I came from IT,” he said.

Wayne began by selling his pudding to family and friends, which quickly led to striking a deal with a local restaurant, then catering and now grocery stores!

“I want this (Puddin Puddin) to be a household name. I want this to be a trusted brand,” he said.

Wayne is part of We Are Cortex, as the Cortex Innovation District in St. Louis helped Wayne successfully scale his business through Cortex’s Square One Program.

His banana pudding and flavors of pudding cheesecakes are now sold in select stores like the Fresh Thyme Market in St. Louis.