JOIN USJayanagar, once upon a time, did not extend beyond South End Circle. And, it was in this Circle that a quaint little bakery opened in 1963 — JB Bakery’s ‘Swadishta’. Started by Ramaswamy Iyengar, it is now run by his son Srinivas along with his brother-in-law Prasad.
“This was a barren land. The Ashoka Pillar, which is 2.2 km away, was clearly visible from our bakery. Opened on ‘Vijayadashami’, we were the only bakery in the area,” says Prasad. One could find a long queue before the bakery, most of which comprised bus commuters. “The fourth block complex never existed then and it was a plain field. People feared to walk around this area and the light from our bakery was the only beacon,” he explains.
The traditional Iyengar bakery had a wooden oven then and served just four items — biscuits, toast, ‘aloo’ bun and puffs. But now, with the aim of catering to both the young and the old generation, they have a wide range of baked items including modern-day pastries, cookies, ‘nippattu’, cakes, chips...the list goes on. All the items here are freshly baked and he says, “We have a tact. The breads baked here are to be sold to the customers within four hours of baking.” He explains, “The company breads take three days to reach the customer and they are not fresh. They are already three-days-old and the bread will have just a two-day shelf life after it reaches the customer. But, this is not the case with us. The breads reach the customer within four hours and they will have an extended shelf life.”
The motto of the bakery is — ‘New bud with old roots’, which he details, “We have a range of upgraded products to cater to the new generation. But we have not forgotten our old roots and hence we stick to the traditional items as well.”
The bakery that has stood the test of time for 52 years now, is not affected by the emergence of newbies in the field and he says that this area should become a bakery bazar.
He says, “Customers are intelligent than businessmen. They know what to choose from where. The increase in number of bakeries will attract more people and there will be more business opportunities. The only thing we have to keep in mind is how special and how different we are from the rest.”
Situated next to two colleges, it has a lot of student crowd coming in. “We have very old customers, who once studied in NMKRV College, coming in with their granddaughters and introducing the bakery to them. It is satisfying and at the same time, exciting to own such a place,” he concludes.