About

An overhead view of 9 season fruit filled kouign amann, golden brown and flaky

Starter Bakery was founded in 2010 by renowned pastry chef Brian Wood and has been baking hand-made pastries on a round the clock schedule to assure the freshest daily products to our customers.

We began as a wholesale company and in 2023 opened our first retail bakery cafe in the Rockridge neighborhood in Oakland. We offer freshly baked pastries, breads, desserts, salads, sandwiches and coffee drinks Wednesday through Sunday.

Our wholesale business has grown to include coffee shops, specialty retail grocers, catering, restaurants, catering and more in the greater Bay Area.

We also sell directly to consumers at a variety of East Bay farmers' markets weekly.

Brian has literally written the book about baking and pastry, Baking and Pastry: A Professional Approach, developed for the San Francisco Baking Institute, where he also taught and developed the pastry program. In addition to that, Brian has worked in R&D for several large, national bakeries and has consulted at bakeries around the country.

A baker at Starter Bakery preparing sourdough batards for the oven
An overhead shot of some pies and quiches from Starter Bakery. Two big pies; one filled with with rhubarb, the other with apple and a streusel topping. Alongside sits a slice of pecan pie and 3 small vegetable filled individual quiches.

Starter Bakery began by selling wholesale to coffee shops and restaurants, and directly to consumers at farmers’ markets. Now we also sell to specialty retailers and our online store.

We bake fresh every day. We deliver to our wholesale customers all over the Bay Area daily. Consumers can order every day.

Why are Starter Bakery's products so delicious? It’s a combination of the freshness, the quality of ingredients, the careful steps we take to produce each item. Everything is made from scratch. We use the highest quality ingredients, sourcing local and directly whenever possible. We don’t rush things. We respect each item and take the time and care each needs to produce the most delicious pastries and breads.

A view of a trolley full of a variety of freshly baked loaves from Starter Bakery. In the background are more trolleys full of more fresh loaves

We moved into our dedicated facility in 2018, greatly expanding our production space and enabling us to bake more and different items. You can learn more about our product breadth on our products page.

"I needed a more interesting life. I could start by learning something. I could start with the starter."

– Robin Sloan, Sourdough