02/25/2026
September 1, 1992 was the official opening date of our Millvale bakery. This is an ad we placed in the local Greensheet newspaper. We had been doing wholesale out of the location for about a year before we opened the doors to the public. During that time mostly elderly women residents of Millvale would cup their hands to the window to peer in and try to see why all the good aromas were wafting from the building. I answered the door to one particularly persistent women. She’d ask over and over when we were going to open. I’d communicate this to Jean-Marc and say people really want us to open. He said no, it will never work. He said no one would come. So it was a tug of war between us for a while. Him repeating it will never work and no one will come and me saying we won’t know unless we try. Finally he relented. Now we are at the end of this journey. Jean-Marc had the drive, talent and stamina to produce an exceptional product. I had a commitment that whatever I ended up doing as a profession would make people happy and contribute to society in a positive way. With a background in marketing and psychology I knew how easy it was to manipulate people, and I felt it was in some way unethical. I wanted the product to speak for itself. To gain followers by word of mouth. Which is the main reason I shunned paid advertising. In a world where truth is in short supply, food is a truth teller. As they say, when the student is ready the teacher appears. I guess you could say Pittsburgh was the student and Jean-Marc was the teacher. At the time there were a smattering of French cafes and restaurants in Pittsburgh which he admired, and i suppose served as some sort of signpost that eventually people would want to come to Millvale buy French pastries. For quite a while we had to apologize to customers who asked us to explain how we could call ourselves a bakery if we didn’t have donuts. Over the years it was interesting to witness the complaints of no donuts change to complaints of how could we call ourselves a French Bakery if we weren’t making the certain type of French pastry they wanted. I guess we felt perpetually misunderstood, except for the ones who got it, and gratefully, who accepted us for the anomaly we were. As I watched how Jean-Marc operated production with employees that the product could not maintain quality if production grew too big. Bigger means not better, and most likely means worse, when it comes to food production. So this has remained for almost 35 years the only place to get Jean-Marc pastries. Production, quality, and freshness of every croissant and cake overseen by the chef. Over and over people asked “why are you in Millvale?” As a young girl I went to St Anthony’s. For school and then for Sunday CCD classes. Millvale was an affordable place to set up shop but at the same time we might contribute to its revitalization efforts. We were at least 20 years ahead of the gentrification trend. It wasn’t celebrated. We were viewed as oddities. At no point has this journey been easy. In fact it’s been incredibly hard, filled with trials and tribulations. It’s always risky and difficult when you see something no one else can see. But that’s what our life journeys are meant to be, in my opinion. And we each have our own special journey, with its own special purpose. Hardship and opposition are teachers. Jean-Marc and I are overwhelmed by the love and support you guys give us each week. We will miss you very much and we hope we can stay in touch some way.
When I threw up the sign “closing 2/28 for the season, ” our intention was reopening around the holidays next year. But as Jean-Marc had to kick it up a gear in the past few weeks he increasingly said to me “I just don’t think I can do it anymore”. Will there be a Hail Mary pass in the final minutes? Most likely not. I said to Jean-Marc if we don’t try to sell the bakery we’ll never know if it was possible. We tried and don’t think it’s possible. Small bakeries like ours will exist only in memories, replaced by chains. It’s happening in France, here and all over the world. It’s becoming economically unfeasible to operate a small chef owned bakery. On every level, in every aspect, running any kind of chef owned business is becoming exceedingly difficult. We are grateful for the opportunity to have served you all these years.
(PS: don’t tell Jean-Marc I said so but maybe we can whip something up in the future)
Open 2/27 Friday 8-5
2/28 Saturday 8-2
Will have only
Breakfast pastries
Apple strudels
Breton Shortbread
But, Jean-Marc has been working hard to make as many croissants as he possible can. So there will be a good number to start.
(I just noticed the address was wrong on the original greensheet ad. 231 instead of 213! )
