Firebrand cafe and bakery in uptown Oakland to close

Firebrand Artisan Breads, a longtime Oakland staple known for its wood-fired breads, pastries and coffee, will shutter its Uptown location on Dec. 20., CEO and owner Matt Kreutz said.

Firebrand has operated out of its large, rustic bakery in the Hive on Broadway since 2015 under an employee-governed trust model, offering employment opportunities to formerly homeless and/or incarcerated people. Now, Kreutz said, due to ongoing financial headwinds and lackluster business support from the city, Firebrand is closing its first retail location while its Alameda cafe and bakery, which opened in the summer of last year, will remain open.

“Our lease is up, and we’ve been working on a larger kind of financial reorganization of the company. It just didn’t make strategic and financial sense to keep the Oakland location open,” Kreutz said. 

The sudden closure felt abrupt to many of the bakery’s staff members, who’d first caught wind of a potential closure from the Hive’s security guards before receiving any official notice from Kreutz. Alex Bermillo, a Firebrand employee, said he felt he and the staff had been left in the dark. 

“It was completely word of mouth. There was no official statement, whether it be an online message, a letter. There was no person-to-person communication,” he said. 

On his end, Kreutz said he waited to inform his staff of any updates until after he’d received confirmation on an exact closing date from the landlord. 

“I’m sure they were caught off guard, but I gave them the information the second I had it,” Kreutz said.

Kreutz had hoped to keep the Oakland bakery running until Dec. 24. But when the building’s landlord served him a three-day notice for termination of the lease effective Wednesday, Dec. 18, Kreutz was able to push the official closing date to Dec. 20. Contacted by phone Monday, Signature Development Group, which developed and owns the Hive, declined to comment. 

Firebrand has found itself in dire financial and legal straits in the last year as it launched itself into a debt restructuring process, which was documented by a San Francisco Chronicle report in January. Firebrand had fallen behind on rent and vendor payments as the company battled several lawsuits and was working to open its Alameda cafe and bakery, including two accusations of wage theft, which Kreutz disputed. While a jury trial is set for February of next year in relation to one of the wage theft claims, it appears that Firebrand is still facing an uphill battle: just last month, Pacific Produce, a farm-to-table wholesale delivery company, sued the company seeking $33,584 in unpaid invoices. 

In the wake of the Oakland closure, about half of the employees will carry on with the company at the Alameda bakery, Kreutz said. 

“The other half we’re going to support in any way we can by making sure that they get any benefits they need, circulating their resumes, reaching out to other kinds of establishments that need help, or posting their resume in certain job boards,” he said. 

In the meantime, Kreutz is looking ahead to developing the Alameda business. 

“We got a lot of really awesome plans in the works for Alameda. We’ve got exciting things happening in our retail cafe. We’re going to be adding a lot of new pastries, new bread. We’ve got a beer and wine license coming,” he said. 

Firebrand is located at 2343 Broadway, Oakland and is closing on Dec. 20, 2024.