Corporate Bagels

It used to be bagel shops were family owned businesses.Everyone worked there, from grandparent to grandchildren with aunts ,uncles and cousins helping out. Tha'ts all changing. Investment companies are looking at this humble business and seeing dollar signs .It's an interesting yet disturbing trend.

Regular contributor Julia Moskin wrote about this in yesterday's New York Times Wednesday Food section. For years bagels were nothing more than mom and pop stores dotting mostly big city main streets.New York was the capital of this,  with Polish Jewish bakers first bringing them over in the late 1800's. They became something of a phenomena during the pandemic. Also a new generation of trend obsessed consumers want the true style, hand rolled and then boiled and baked originals.New chains featuring these are in need in the SOuth and the Sunbelt where there is a demand. With that comes big business, namely investment firms looking to make more money. The big change came in 2023  when Stripes a food focused equity company invested eight million dollars in Pop Up Bagels, a once small privately owned bagel shop.It does offer what a traditional mom and pop store offers. There are five types of bagels and customers can get a schmear of cream cheese or salted butter. Yet it also has trendy toppings like  cake cream cheese and berry butter.

What else spurred this interest? Americans are eating more and breakfasts on the go. Doughnuts, cinnamon rolls and bagels are the quick bite of choice. It also makes sense for bagel shops to serve the much wanted bagel sandwich.This usually consists of bacon, cheese and egg on a bagel, a sandwich not many smaller bagel shops will make. These are the money makers according to Andres Samper, the founder of Manhattan Bagel Equity Fund , a bagel specific investment fund that is focused on acquiring,  rebranding and scaling high performing bagels shops across the US. Butter bagels that only cost tow or three dollars are not going to keep a business alive.It;s these sandwiches, sometimes costing as high as fifteen or sixteen dollars , is what will keep a bagel shop running. Another aspect is that the money also feeds the cost of high tech ovens to make the perfect bagel whenever they are in the country . The Turbofan oven can quickly bake bagels throughout the day . Bagel affectionados may not be impressed by this They feel all this fanciness will flatten profits and the bagels themselves. Stores could wind up being run into the ground.

Bagel shops should be what they were in the past. They need to be family owned businesses who care for their food and their customers. Fancy bagel stores come and go. Family ones can last for generations.