Thank you for being a friend New bakery has rapidly gained a loyal following By: Eva Wasney Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Tuesday, Apr. 18, 2023

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/04/2023 (873 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Every day is a “camp day” at Friend Bakery & Pizza.

No, the new South Osborne eatery doesn’t offer archery, canoeing or arts and crafts. There are no talent shows, bunk beds or fireside sing-alongs. There is some knot-tying, but it involves strands of dough rather than rope.

A “camp day” is a state of mind.

“It’s a lot of on-the-spot problem-solving, thinking on your feet, having to be creative with limited resources,” says owner and head baker Max Palay. “And maintaining a decent attitude while you’re doing it.”

All skills he learned as a camper, counsellor and administrator at Camp Massad.

The Jewish sleepaway camp near Winnipeg Beach is also where Palay sourced most of his staff, including marketing and business manager Drew McGillawee.

“He poached me,” jokes McGillawee, who was working as a camp director when the bakery business was coming into focus.

Both in their late 20s, the pair of lifelong friends met as young campers and rose through the ranks together. They hold their formative lakeside experiences in high regard.

“Any job or anything I’ve ever done outside of camp, I’ve only been able to do… because of my experiences at camp,” McGillawee says.

It was at Camp Massad, in between cleaning cabins and overseeing operations, where they first started daydreaming about running a business together. There were many iterations — a brewery, a café, a full-scale restaurant — all revolving around food and drink.

But when it came time to start charting their respective career paths, sensibility won out. McGillawee got an office job and Palay ended up in accounting.

“I was lucky enough to get into both business school and culinary school,” Palay says. “I figured culinary is my passion, but business makes sense.”

That cost-benefit analysis crumbled during the pandemic. Even though he was able to work remotely from his “happy place” (the family cottage), he was becoming less enthralled with the actual work.

“I knew that if I was going to do this for the rest of my life, it was gonna be a real painful journey,” he says.

During school, Palay spent a stint making pizzas at Carbone. He loved the process and started experimenting with his own pies at the cottage. Then bread, then pastry.

Soon, his days revolved around dough — he was kneading, folding and shaping in between emails, Zoom calls and spreadsheets. It was time for a change.

Palay considered getting a job at a local bakery or pizzeria, but no one was hiring and his self-professed authority issues prompted him to pursue the business he had long fantasized about. He recruited McGillawee and they started making a plan and scouting locations.

The empty concrete retail space in the main floor of a new apartment building on Osborne Street, south of Confusion Corner, fit the bill: a blank slate in a bustling neighbourhood.

The shop has been warmed up with a long wood-faced counter, a handful of seats and the constant smell of fresh baking.

Friend’s tagline is “bakery by day, pizza shop by night.” Palay was adamant about opening a spot that catered to his equal passions for baking and ‘za — even though it’s made for a wild 4 a.m.-to-11 p.m. work schedule.

“I sleep on Mondays,” he says.

During the day, the shop serves loaves, sweets and coffee; at night, 16-inch “New York-ish”-style pizzas fly out of the large industrial oven.

Forty pies are available daily beginning at 5 p.m.

The afternoon changeover is punctuated by shifting sounds and aromas — easy listening turns to classic rock and wafts of warm chocolate are slowly replaced by the savoury smell of tomatoes, basil and cheese.

There were a lot of names on the table but Friend just felt right. It’s a loving moniker within their friendship group and Palay’s mom was known to sing You’ve Got a Friend by James Taylor as a lullaby.

It also captured the ethos they were going for.

“What better way to create a welcoming environment than with that word?” McGillawee says. “We want to be friends with everybody in the neighbourhood.”

The name has created some fun marketing opportunities. The bakery’s logo is a cartoon waving hand, which greets customers on signage and staff uniforms. The partners also enlisted the help of social media followers to anthropomorphize some of their staple menu items. Enter Cinnamon Knot Cindy, Cookie Carl, Sourdough Sam and Pizza Pete.

“I always love when brands are personable,” McGillawee says. “To give people as much input as possible is really important to me, it (ensures) people are liking what we do and wanting to come back.”

Friend has been open for less than a month and already the bakery-pizzeria has gained a loyal following. For Palay, it’s confirmation that risks can be worth the reward and that age-old advice — such as “never go into business with friends” — is more of a suggestion than a rule.

“It’s worked out pretty well so far,” he says of surrounding himself with friendly faces and friendly food.

eva.wasney@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @evawasney