Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, December 30, 1994 TAG: 9412300105
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SARAH HUNTLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Fuel Oil & Equipment Co. Inc. plans to open as many as seven Chesapeake Bagel Bakeries in Roanoke, Montgomery County and the Lynchburg area. Construction on the first shop at Old Country Plaza will begin Tuesday with an opening in early March, and plans for a second shop at Ridgewood Farms with a May 1 target date will follow.
"We have a development schedule where we'll try to open one every six months or so," said Gil McGeorge, vice president and chief financial officer of the oil distributor.
The bakeries will be franchises of a McLean-based national chain that offers 12 to 15 varieties of bagels, all of which are baked from scratch at each restaurant. The shops also sell bagel sandwiches and pizza bagels as well as homemade soups, salads, desserts and gourmet coffees. Each restaurant seats 40 to 50 people.
"These upscale bagel restaurants will be a great addition to the Roanoke Valley," McGeorge said.
Bagels are a far cry from fuel, but McGeorge said the company has had plenty of experience in food operations. Fuel Oil & Equipment owns the EZN chain of convenience stores, many of which offer food services, he said.
McGeorge acknowledged that the company is making a sizeable investment in this project, but he declined to give a specific amount, saying only that it was more than $100,000 and less than a half-million dollars.
Fuel Oil & Equipment has been spurred by studies that show bagels are the latest rage in bread products. In 1988 the U.S. Department of Commerce reported yearly bagel consumption of 2.47 pounds per person. By 1993, that had risen to an estimated 3.56 pounds. The Department of Commerce estimated that more than 800 million pounds of bagels were sold in 1992.
"The product is not very expensive. Our typical sandwich, and this is a ballpark figure, will be in the $3 to $4 range," McGeorge said. "It's also a product that's very health-oriented. Bagels are low-fat."
The nation's bagel craze had been slow to hit the Roanoke Valley. Then, in June, Hal and Joanne Stern opened the area's only fresh bagel shop, Five-Boro Bagels, in Southwest Plaza shopping center. Business has been booming there since day one with an estimated 500 customers a day, and the Sterns are looking to open another shop in the downtown City Market area.
Although McGeorge said Chesapeake Bagel Bakeries is unlikely to affect any other bagel business, there's little doubt the new restaurants are just the beginning of the local bagel wars.
"Anytime some competition comes in, there is concern, and people may go there at first to give them a try," Hal Stern said. "But we can make bagels according to our standards, not according to franchise standards. When people start comparing, we're going to win."
But McGeorge noted that Chesapeake Bagels will be made in the shops, unlike most bakery chains, where dough is made at a central commissary, frozen and shipped to individual stores.
"That's one of the unique things about our concept," he said. "Every store will offer bagels made fresh every day on-site."
Then there's the matter of atmosphere. Five-Boro Bagels is a small, casual shop. Chesapeake Bagel Bakeries is proud to tout its "upscale" ambience.
"People like our environment," said Michael Robinson, who opened the first Chesapeake Bagel Bakery in Washington, D.C., with partner Alan Manstof in 1981. "In contemporary America, it's as close as you're going to get to yesteryear's corner coffee shop."
The Sterns didn't have much regard for that either.
"They are fancy and glitzy, sure," Joanne Stern said. "But the flavor of the bagel will get lost underneath that glitz."
How the businesses fare remains to be seen, but both sides believe demand will continue to grow.
"Overall, the Chesapeake Bagel Bakeries may help us," Hal Stern said. "They will bring more bagel awareness to the valley. This is not New York City, where people are used to having a bagel every morning, but as people become more familiar with bagels, business can only get better."
by CNB