bake - July 2018 - 22

baking business when he opened the ﬁrst Busken

Other bakeries have followed different paths as

store in the Hyde Park neighborhood. His father, Clem,

they moved from one generation to the next. In

had run a bakery in Oklahoma City after working as a

Cincinnati, Servatii Pastry Shop & Deli has 12 stores

route salesmen for Fleischmann Yeast Co. In Busken's

throughout the tri-state region and numerous

early years, Joe would bake all night and sell all day,

wholesale customers. The Gottenbusch family has

counting every penny along the way.

been preparing fresh baked goods since the 1800s.
Great grandfather George started out in Muenster,

By the 1950s, business was expanding and more loca-

Germany, driving a horse-drawn wagon door to

tions were added. Joe Busken Jr. joined the family

door selling his fresh baked goods. His son, George,

business in 1952 at a time when there were about 50

attended Germany's most recognizable baking school

employees. An engineer by trade, he designed an

and received his "Konditor Meister" status as Master

efficient production workﬂow inside their ﬁrst big

Pastry Chef. By the early '50s, George opened Café

bakery: "Commodities would come in through the

Servatii, next to St. Servatii Church - named after

back docks to a storage area, and the mixing and

an Italian saint - on Servatii Platz, in the heart of

processing would occur nearby," according to Busken

Muenster, Germany. His son Wilhelm followed in his

history. "The heavy mixing zone would give way to

footsteps. He earned his Master Status, traveled the

six ovens: from the ovens, baked goods would move

world, working in Australia, Poland and on an interna-

into the decorating zone or into walk-in freezers,

tional freighter before settling in Cincinnati.

which could also hold unbaked goods. From there,
the goods would head to boxing zones and deco-

Now, the fourth generation has continued the family

rating areas back near the loading docks before being

tradition. Wilhelm's sons, Gary and Greg, both

shipped to grocery retailing partners or one of the

apprenticed in Germany. Gary continued his training

satellite Busken stores."

and earned his Master Baker Certiﬁcation in 2001. He
is the third Gottenbusch to reach this level.

Innovation would come again in the 1970s with Joe's
son, Page, at the helm. Supermarkets were opening

Poland was the home country of the Jucker family,

bakeries, and competition was getting ﬁerce. The

which now operates Three Brothers Bakery in Houston.

industry was shifting from production driven to

The Jucker family began baking in Chrzanow, Poland,

marketing driven, and Page Busken, armed with a

in a building in which Napoleon had spent a night.

business degree from college and a wealth of bakery

For ﬁve generations and almost 200 years, the Jucker

knowledge from the family business, was up to the

family has been baking traditional breads. The Jucker

challenge. "In the 1970s, we introduced the bakery

family estimates the ﬁrst bakery in Poland opened

cafe, with breakfast and lunch, all before Panera was

between 1825 and 1841. The last known name for the

around," Page recalls. "That was really successful."

bakery in Poland was Morris Jucker's Bakery. When

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