New Bread Alone factory rising in Lake Katrine

Photo courtesy of Focus Media.

Coming soon to 2121 Ulster Avenue in Lake Katrine: The heady smell of fresh-baked bread. A lot of it.

State and local officials gathered Monday to cut the ribbon on a Lake Katrine building that will be the site of Bread Alone's new 26,000-square-foot bakery. The building will house Bread Alone's second commercial bakery, in addition to the original bakery on Route 28 in Boiceville, and will also host a retail outlet on site.

Since its founding in 1983, Bread Alone has grown from a small artisanal bakery to a brand known across the region and New York City -- and one of the region's brightest small-business success stories. With the new Lake Katrine production facility, owners say, the company is on track to double its revenue over the next five years.

The new building will cost nearly $5 million to buy and renovate, much of it coming from federal investment. Earlier this month, U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer announced that Bread Alone would receive a loan of $4.6 million from the USDA for the new facility. The company has also received a $250,000 loan from a local small-business investment fund, Hudson River Ventures.

Schumer couldn't pass up an opportunity to make a bunch of baking puns. (And, as our headline clearly demonstrates, neither can we.) In his announcement about the $4.6 million USDA loan, Schumer calls the federal funding "the yeast that literally raises the dough, not only for Bread Alone, but for the local community as well." And in a press release about yesterday's event, Schumer says, "When I stood with the HVEDC and announced the formation of a Hudson Valley Food and Beverage Alliance – this is exactly the type of relationship we wanted to cook up."

Shown in photo, from left to right: Nels Leader, of Bread Alone; Sean Eldridge, founder of Hudson River Ventures, Ulster County Executive Mike Hein; Octavia and Sharon Leader, of Bread Alone; U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer; Mike Oates, of Hudson Valley Economic Development Corp.; Town of Ulster Supervisor James Quigley and Dan Leader, founder and owner of Bread Alone.