Sandpoint's First Avenue Bakery District: Who's Open Which Day This Fall

Before Abby Stolfo opened The Cakery on First, she emailed Jill Severson, the owner of Bluebird Bakery a few doors away, to say she was thinking about opening a cakery. "She got right back to me and said, 'What do you need?'" Stolfo told the Sandpoint Reader. "She even sent us flowers on our opening day."

According to Stolfo, people now joke about "the battle of the bakeries" on the block around First Avenue and Cedar Street. Three bakeries now sit within a few doors of each other, each owner came up through a different route, and each keeps a different schedule. In practice the block works as a weekly rotation, and with The Cakery on a seasonal break until mid-November, which day you show up matters more than usual.

Three addresses, one short stretch of First Avenue

The anchor is Bluebird Bakery at 329 N. First Ave. Severson founded it in October 2019, and the Bonner County Daily Bee covered its Oct. 31, 2019 ribbon-cutting at the corner of First and Cedar. Nearly seven years later, its menu runs from croissants, cruffins and monkey bread to a huckleberry-vanilla Danish, with daily breads and rotating seasonal pastries. Its homepage also advertises a full kitchen menu.

The Cakery on First opened June 20, 2026 at 323 N. First Ave., in the space Ward Tollbom used for Hen's Tooth Studio before he retired. The Reader's profile lists banana cardamom cream cheese coffee cake, blueberry rhubarb butter crumb muffins, chocolate zucchini bread and lemon curd pound cakes and tarts. The espresso comes from Doma, a roaster in Post Falls.

Across the street at 320 N. First Ave., Sawyers Bakery took over the old Image Maker space. A September Reader profile describes afternoon shelves emptied by customers buying pistachio twists, éclairs and cups of tea.

Each one came from somewhere different

All three bakeries sit on the same block of First Avenue, but they didn't start from the same place, and that helps explain why they don't feel like copies of one another.

Stolfo sold cakes at the Sandpoint Farmers' Market starting in 2023. She baked in a detached garage she had converted into a commercial kitchen, and her mother helped. At the market she met Charlie and Donna Parrish, who told her their storefront was about to open up when Tollbom retired. She calls the result "the accidental bakery," and her menu focuses on what she describes as "nostalgic baked goods that you want to eat."

Becky Sawyer's route goes back further. She told the Reader her family arrived in Sandpoint in 1903 with the railroad, and her great-uncle Bode Kemmis baked at Haworth's Bakery, which once stood just down the street from her shop. She credits his maple bars, which locals still talk about, with starting her interest in baking. Later she completed a 400-hour pastry and chocolate program at Amaury Guichon's Pastry Academy outside Las Vegas, then managed the bakery at Winter Ridge. She spent five years looking for a lease that would let her install a kitchen. Once she found one, her family handled nearly everything except the work that required licensed trades. The shop's motto is "Flour, butter, tradition."

Each of the three moved into a downtown space when it came open. The Cakery found its space through relationships Stolfo built at the market. Sawyer found hers after five years of looking for one that could hold a kitchen.

The block runs on a weekly rotation

Because each owner set her own hours, the three bakeries don't line up. On any given day the district is open in a different combination.

Bluebird is open daily from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., according to its website. Sawyers lists Tuesday through Saturday, 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., and on Sundays it serves afternoon tea by reservation only. The Cakery lists Thursday through Sunday, 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., but its homepage says the shop is on a break from 9/26 to 11/12 and reopens on November 12.

Two more spots in walking distance fill out the week. Paneah's Bistro, upstairs in the Cedar Street Bridge at 334 N. First Ave., Suite 200, serves sourdough cinnamon rolls, muffins, croissants and coffee. Its site lists Monday through Saturday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The Granary General Store at 518 Oak St. opened this summer, and the Reader reported in August that it is open every day except Wednesday, 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Here's how those posted hours work out across a week this fall:

Bluebird is the only one on the list open every day. Monday is the one day Sawyers is closed. Monday and Wednesday are tied as the thinnest days, with three spots open on each, and on Wednesday it's because The Granary takes the day off. From Nov. 12 on, Thursday through Saturday are the only days all five keep regular counter hours.

Most of these hours come from the businesses' own websites, and small bakeries adjust as staffing and seasons change. Stolfo told the Reader she might fine-tune The Cakery's hours. Check before you make a special trip.

What changes on November 12

The Cakery's homepage says online ordering will resume in November and the shop will reopen on November 12. This year that date falls on a Thursday, the first day of its usual Thursday-through-Sunday week. Until then, the corner of First and Cedar has two bakeries open instead of three, and Sawyers and Bluebird are open together Tuesday through Saturday.

After the reopening, The Cakery's site describes a morning case with baked goods and quiche, then cupcakes in the afternoon and cake by the slice on weekends, alongside Doma coffee and espresso.

The weeks after mid-November are also when people start ordering food for gatherings. Neither Bluebird nor Sawyers has posted a holiday program. Bluebird's homepage says it takes special orders. Sawyers says it accepts a limited number of custom orders depending on staffing and supply, and it requires seven days' notice. Anyone planning a table for late November should count back from that seven-day minimum.

The same pattern a few blocks out

The farmers' market route that brought The Cakery to First Avenue also produced The Granary. Co-owner Sam Podmajerski sold hundreds of sourdough loaves a week at a Sandpoint Farmers' Market booth, and that's where she met Emily Peilleron, who had spent a decade running a bakery in France's Basque region. Before opening on Oak Street, across from Matchwood Brewing Co. in the Granary Arts District, the two hosted quarterly Sandpoint Supper Club evenings at Evans Brothers Coffee. They describe their menu as "simple but elevated," the Reader reported.

South of the bridge, Samantha and Chris Cuneo opened The Bakehouse as a walk-up bakery at 15 Sagle Road in mid-August. The Daily Bee's August profile listed hours of Wednesday through Sunday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. That's worth knowing for anyone coming into town on U.S. 95 on a day when The Granary is closed.

Between July and September, the Reader profiled three new Sandpoint bakeries. Two of their owners built a following at the farmers' market before signing a lease, and the third baked from home for years before spending five years on a lease search. Bluebird has been on the corner since 2019, and it helped the newest arrival get started.

At Chris Briner, we follow downtown Sandpoint at the level of which storefronts change hands and what moves into them. If you own a home within walking distance of First and Cedar and want to know what that location adds to its value, start with an instant home valuation.