Santa Cruz Manresa Bread “Mini Shop” to Open Nov. 7 

November 1, 2022 – Head baker and partner in the steadily rising Manresa Bread empire, Avery Ruzicka, admits that opening three new outlets in a single year has been quite an undertaking. “It is such a lot!” she says, “We opened Palo Alto in April, and the Los Gatos flagship has taken over a year of planning. I’m relieved to have that open, and very excited for the Santa Cruz store! COVID really impacted the supply chain, but things have a way of working out the way they are supposed to.”

The Los Gatos shop, which is an all day café, opened on Thursday, October 27, and the new 300-square-foot Santa Cruz location, which she refers to as a “mini,” will debut on November 7, at 8am. Located at 300 Ingalls Street, adjacent to Marini’s Candies, it will be focused on bread, laminated pastries and a limited number of to-go items. Just don’t expect coffee. 

“There’s already so much coffee on the Westside and we don’t have much room: it’s a postage stamp, actually! It’s kind of like when I did pop-ups!”  She lives only a 5-minute walk away, with her three rescue dogs, and couldn’t be happier to finally be bringing her signature bread and pastries to her backyard. 

She admits that the Santa Cruz outlet was not initially in the cards for 2022, but just the right location became available. “We have wanted to do this forever!  We have so many loyal supporters who have been traveling over the hill to the Los Gatos store.”

The hours in Santa Cruz will be 8am until 3pm, or until sold out: expect the sellout to happen rapidly for the first few days until they can gauge a response. You can always pre-order using TOCK. Ruzicka doesn’t anticipate difficulty in ramping up to deliver the daily bread.

“We are truly 24×7 these days, so this is just another location we can serve. We literally can deliver whatever the demand is: our team is prepped and ready. We already deliver to Verve here.”

One of the elements she’s particularly excited about in the Santa Cruz shop is the new artwork from Ethan Estess, an ocean researcher and artist whose studio happens to be on Ingalls Street. He also did the wall art for the Manresa Bread Campbell store.  Estess uses a lot of marine debris and ocean trash in his works. 

“We commissioned three pieces from him that as a whole that look like a big wave, but when you look closer, you see that it’s fishing nets,” says Ruzicka. Stanford educated Estess reminds us that single use plastics last pretty much forever, and encourages each of us to be mindful of what and how we consume and where that trash ends up.

Ruzicka is really encouraged by the high level of interest in Thanksgiving specialties, like panettone, babka, pecan pie, apple pie and pumpkin cheesecake. “All of our Thanksgiving items are really popular!” She says their butter buns (which are like Parker House rolls) sold out quickly last year, so they are gearing up to meet a high demand. Still, early ordering is encouraged, and it’s not too soon to think about Christmas goodies. She also has some baking kits available, so check out the website for those. 

While she has quite a team working for her now, Ruzicka herself still keeps baker’s hours, rising at 3am and going to bed at 8pm nightly. She says they have at least five bakers on at night, putting loads of quiches and breads into the oven. “We operate in a sequence. Someone has already done the bread proofing and another takes it across the finish line. They are not starting from scratch on each shift. The whole thing is such a collaborative effort: it’s a true symbiosis!” Still, she admits this will definitely be the biggest test of the organization, especially with the Santa Cruz store coming online just before the holidays. 

Opening day items can be reserved here: ManresaCruz

Thanksgiving items can be ordered here: ManresaThanksgiving

Bless those night owl bakers for making sure we have croissants to begin the day.