Nishon has always had a passion for cooking and baking. He began his career at the ripe old age of 12 as a dishwasher in a local diner in his hometown. He quickly worked his way out of the dish room and onto the line where he was a proficient short order cook. Not only was he a quick learner, but has an incredible palate, and a real talent in the kitchen. He went on to work at a variety of food establishments; everything from family friendly to fine dining.
In 2000, at the request of his then girlfriend, he came to Philadelphia and began working in the kitchen of Le Bec Fin doing prep work. Work there was slow, but there was a request for help from the kitchen of Striped Bass. They needed help in their pastry shop. That is where Nishon's passion for pastry and baking flourished. He worked under a variety of different executive pastry chefs, and learned quite a lot. He also contributed quite a bit. He participated, and ultimately spearheaded, the baking for all of the sister restaurants, including Rouge, Bleu, and Avenue B. Nishon experimented making baking bread for all of the restaurants. It was an instant hit. His breads were incredible, and he was saving the company an enormous amount of money by doing it all in-house with the existing staff. As time progressed, Nishon became more interested in the chemistry and process of bread baking. In 2003, he was the Executive Pastry Chef at Striped Bass. Right before he got married at the end of 2003, he decided to leave Striped Bass and open his own bread bakery.
Bread by Nishon was born out of Nishon's passion for bread baking. It was started with absolutely no start-up capital, and sales of $4 a day to a local BYOB. Fortunately, we had a great friend and colleague with a small pastry bakery of his own in South Philadelphia, who allowed us to sublease a small amount of his space for a very nominal amount of money. In the beginning, Nishon worked 7 days and did everything from start to finish. That included making the doughs, baking the bread, bagging it, loading his car, doing the dishes, cleaning-up, and then deliverying the bread. In our first year, 2003, we only did a couple hundred dollars in sales. The word spread amongst chefs in the Philadelphia area, and demand took off.
In early 2004, Nishon brought in Melissa, who had worked for him at Striped Bass while she was attending the Culinary Institute of America. She was the bakery's first official paid employee. The initial focus was a limited bread offering, which basically was formed as a result of the demand from Philadelphia chefs. As the year progressed, the number of employees increased along with sales. By 2005, the operation had outgrown its space. The bakery was operating overnight to meet the demand for fresh bread in the morning, and also to accomodate the pastry bakery we were subleasing space from. The bakery's mixing and baking was all done in a room that was about 15 feet x 15 feet. It consisted of a 60qt mixer, a 20 qt mixer, a set of 4 decks, a set of convection ovens, and a small proof box. The employee count had grown to 4. We began to explore the possibility of expanding into an adjoining garage space, but quickly discovered the rennovations were too cost prohibitive. We needed space, a lot more space, and we did not have any options.
In the beginning of 2006, a chance encounter in the local restaurant supply store made us aware of a struggling commercial pastry bakery available in North East Philadelphia. Nishon made a visit to the former Creative Cakes & Confections and met with Madeline MacDonald. The place was dark, cold, and dirty. Madeline was very ill, and was hoping to find a buyer who could rescue the current business that had tried to finance a purchase of her bakery, but had failed. Not exactly a dream bakery, but Nishon saw the potential. He could also relate to the passion Madeline had for her bakery, and appreciate all the work she had put into it. So, we put together a business plan, took out a loan, and brought in Melissa as our partner.
From this new venture, Wild Flour Bakery was born. We finalized the sale April 29, 2006. The first few months were a struggle as we tried to get the bakery in order. We had a lot of debt, a lot of space, and a lot of work to do. We hired one new baker, right out of school and he has been incredible. Ed Pinkos truly shares Nishon's vision and passion for the bakery. The first year was rough, as we were trying to figure-out how everything was going to work together. We now had a completely new business with the pastry side, as well as our bread bakery that we wanted to maintain and grow. Amongst all of this chaos, Nishon and Laura had another surprise coming their way. A baby boy. Nishon Jr was born March 11, 2007, a month before our one year anniversary at our new bakery.
Then in May, Laura began talking with an old friend about the possibility of a retail store. Michael was just as excited as she was, and together they began to explore retail possibilities. During this time Nicky from the Food Trust approached Nishon about participating in the new Head House Farmers Market. This has been our first and only retail establishment, and has been a lot of fun and great exposure for the bakery. Not only do we love doing it, but we have met a lot of great people and have had the opportunity to display our incredible products.
2008 has been a year of incredible milestones and incredible struggles. We participated in our 2nd season at the Head House, and also had successful 1st year seasons at North Hills, PA and Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, PA. Again we hoped this year would bring a retail store, but it was not to be. October 2008 was our 5 year anniversary which came and went without much fanfare, as we were so busy with all our new markets, and trying to figure out the direction the bakery should take. Commodities, like flour, butter, and gas, have been all over the place and have really had a huge impact on our business. The struggles, and ultimate dissolution of some of our biggest customers has also weighed heavily on us this year. We are happy to say that things have calmed down prices have once again stablized, and our customer base is once again steady and growing. We are looking forward to this year coming to an end and a fresh start in 2009 with a whole host of new possibilities.