One Sweet Street could become the new go-to address in Oakmont starting Feb. 5.
That’s the day of the highly anticipated opening of the new location of Oakmont Bakery — one of the region’s busiest family-owned independent bakeries that serves between 1,000 to 2,500 customers a day.
The new space is almost three times larger than the original, provides 110 parking spots (instead of its current 12), adds 20 more employees for a total of 136, accommodates 80 indoor seats (instead of 30), increases the number of registers to 14, expands breakfast and lunch menus, adds a fireplace and includes other improvements.
Some things won’t change, however: the hours; its line of bagels, doughnuts and cookies; and what the bakery represents.
“We have been in this current location for 18 years, and we have had customers telling us, ‘I feel so sad as it’s the last time I’m coming here for Christmas’ and all that. And I love that people have that feeling, but the bakery is us,” says owner Marc Serrao. “It is about the people who work here. I grew up with some of them who have worked here for almost 30 years. The bakery family is what it is all about.”
The main reason for the move from 531 Allegheny Ave. to 1 Sweet St. is to have a bigger production facility, he says. The current space is tight, and in fact, so tight that employees often have to work elbow to elbow and no equipment can be added.
The new building, which has plenty of natural light as well as hipster lighting that complements the modern streamlined look, is 19,500 square feet and dwarfs the current retail and production buildings, which are each 3,400 square feet. On the second level, employees have a break area with their own kitchen. The staff will grow from 116 to 136 and include more bakers, decorators, customer associates and maintenance staff.
And yes, Sweet Street is a new route he created off Hulton Road to encourage motorists to drive behind the Walgreens to a large parking lot for the new site.
Traffic challenges
Although parking options are ample, traffic restrictions might leave some people stewing, especially if they want to pick up a quick bagel or doughnut on their way to work. Turning restrictions from Third Street onto Hulton Road have been in place for years: Those exiting the bakery on Third Street cannot turn left from 7 to 9 a.m. and 2 to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday in deference to Riverview High School, which is across from the bakery. To get back onto Hulton Road from the parking lot in front of the bakery at those times, motorists have to drive in a square the opposite direction: go southbound on Third Street, turn left onto Archie Street, left onto Allegheny Avenue and finally a left back onto Hulton.
Ordering procedures inside the new bakery will remain the same: Customers take a number when they arrive. Payment for prepaid orders, pay-for-food-orders made at kiosks and for items picked up elsewhere in the store can be made at one of the three Sweet Line registers. Customers also will be able to make the kiosk orders by using the Oakmont Bakery app on their phone.
Despite the upgrades, Mr. Serrao says the bakery has been and “will always be a bagel shop, cake shop, doughnut shop and a cafe.” With the addition of the deli kitchen he will offer more items such as pancakes and crepes to the breakfast menu. Sandwiches, salads and soups will be served for lunch and dinner in addition to rolls and pastries. He recently added salato, a mini roll made with French bread dough and stuffed with Italian sausage, mashed potatoes, onions and green pepper.
Bakery’s third move
So how quickly will it move operations? “We will be baking Sunday night and shutting down baking production on Monday morning” and producing fewer items than usual to pare down merchandise, Mr. Serrao says. “We will close the bakery at our current location Monday evening.”
He’s hired four local companies to move the equipment and dry cases. The refrigerator cases are all new and already are in place, and so are the sound, camera and phone systems. “The hook-ups are all ready for the fryers, and new ovens, steam boxes and mixers are already in place there,” he says. “All the movers have to do is to pick up the equipment, drive them up and plug them in.”
He says the movers are confident the bakery will be ready for business by Tuesday at 9 a.m., following an 8 a.m. ribbon-cutting ceremony.
While he may not be taking all the black-and-white photographs of his children and grandchildren that hang on the walls now, there is one thing that will be moving. It is a stained glass artwork, which his late father gave him when he opened the Allegheny Avenue shop 18 years ago. It says Oakmont Bakery and has the old Oakmont logo on it.
He acknowledges that he has come a long way from the days when he first bought Oakmont Bakery almost 30 years. At that time it was on Allegheny River Boulevard and was 1,000 square feet. The building came on the market when its 40-year-old owner died of a heart attack only nine days after he had opened the bakery. “The guy’s brother was the one who made it possible for me to buy it by holding the mortgage,” he recalls gratefully.
While he would have liked to have changed the name to Serrao he couldn’t afford to pay $8,000 to change the signs. So the name remained Oakmont Bakery, even after Mr. Serrao moved the business five years later to what is now the production building on Allegheny Avenue. As business grew, space became tight again and so he bought the building across from it about five years later for the retail part.
For Oakmont Bakery’s third move, Mr. Serrao’s son, Tony, 31, is shouldering a lot of the responsibilities. “Tony is the general manager, who can really run the show. He is the whole reason for the new location,” he says beaming. “We are so much alike. I would call him the new and improved version of me.”
Tony has helped with the bakery since he was 5. He took some business courses after high school and then attended AIB International School of Baking, which is affiliated with the Kansas State University, and earned a degree in the science of baking.
Tony’s entrepreneurial abilities also give Mr. Serrao an assurance that the bakery will last for a long time, he says. His daughter Stephanie, who earned a degree in business marketing at the University of Pittsburgh, serves as the bakery’s operations director. In addition, his son-in-law Billy O’Block, who earned a degree in business entrepreneurship at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, is assisting longtime employee and retail manager Michael Sullivan with the retail management.
Mr. Serrao says he and his wife, Susan, who co-owns the bakery, are in the middle of succession planning and putting the business in a family trust so that all their five children will own a portion.
Ribbon cutting
A quiet opening day is planned for Tuesday. The bakery will open at 8 a.m. with a brief ribbon-cutting ceremony. After that the bakery will retain its original hours and be open 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday-Saturday and 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday.
Mr. Serrao hopes to rent both the original retail and production buildings once they are emptied. He has already heard from a couple of companies that are interested in the properties, he says, but is being cautious about picking his tenants.
“I don’t want them to be our competitors. So, you can be sure it won’t a bakery or a coffee shop or a Subway,” he says, laughing.
Arthi Subramaniam: asubramaniam@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1494.
First Published: January 31, 2019, 11:30 a.m.
