Benno Groeneveld
Web reporter

Franklin Street Bakery held an open house on Tuesday at its new location, the site of a once notorious SuperAmerica station on East Franklin Avenue between 10th and 11th Avenue in the Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis.

The open house was held about at the mid-point between the opening of the bakery's wholesale activities earlier this month and the opening of its retail store scheduled for mid-November.

The bakery was founded in 1994 by Mark Haugen and Wayne Kostroski, co-owners of Cuisine Concepts, a restaurant managing company whose operations include Goodfellow's, Tejas and Bar Abilene in the Twin Cities.

The bakery had been on Franklin Avenue, but eight blocks west from its current location.

When the owners started looking for a place to expand, they looked both in the inner city and in the suburbs. Wayne Kostroski acknowledged that the company could, and maybe should, have moved to an industrial park in the suburbs. But that would have gone against the owners' desire to combine business and community. "We are in business first, we are out to make a profit. But we also look for another angle," and a way to contribute to the community.

Kostroski cited such advantages for remaining in the area, including the work ethic of people living there, "which is excellent, transportation is excellent and the pride of our employees in their work is the highest I have ever seen."

The new bakery also comes with an unusual touch: "We added windows, to the delight of the employees" Kostroski said. The windows not only make the bakery more accessible, "they make the employees the star of the show" giving passers-by a view of all stages of bread baking.

The new location will employ 65 people. The owners anticipate the bakery will need another 35 to 40 employees over the next three years.

The new Franklin Street Bakery site was developed by the American Indian Neighborhood Development Corporation (AINDC), a group that was created in 1975 by a group of American Indian women who wanted to improve the neighborhood through developing commercial real estate in the area.

AINDC now owns seven commercial blocks along East Franklin Avenue and leases space to 47 tenants, providing more than 400 jobs. The projects include the Franklin Circles shopping center, the Franklin Business Center, the Ancient Traders Market and the new bakery.

On Tuesday, the AINDC also received a MetLife Foundation Community-Police Partnership Award, one of seven given annually.

The award includes a $30,000 gift and recognizes another AINDC effort: The Franklin Avenue Community Safety Center, a collaborative effort with the Minneapolis police department and local business and community organizations.

bgroeneveld@bizjournals.com | (612) 288-2101

Source: American City Business Journals Inc.