
Bristol is hungry for bagels. That’s the word on the street anyway. But, despite our unlikely connection to New York, you won’t find nearly as many delicious bagel shops here as you will in the Big Apple. But The Little Bagel Co. is helping to change that and doubling its output very soon.
Like many of the best ideas these days, The Little Bagel Co. was born out of the pandemic. While everyone else was baking banana bread, owner Wesley Thompson taught himself to make bagels. He’s now making hundreds of NY-style bagels daily, using fermented dough made fresh every morning, just to keep up with the demand.
“I had a background in restaurant management and a sales job in a coffee roastery, but having my own place has always been a bit of a dream,” said Wesley. “When Covid happened, I decided to just go for it. I’d been to New York and loved freshly baked bagels – but there were none in Bristol.”
After two years of serving university students and workers at the top of Queen Street, The Little Bagel Co. is now ready to start its NY-inspired bagels to “city centre office workers” after securing Start Up Loan funding from the British Business Bank to expand. It’s opening its second location on Baldwin Street and is already looking for new team members to join it.
There aren’t anywhere near as many great lunch options around the University of Bristol as there are in the city centre. Still, The Little Bagel Co. has more than enough to succeed. You’ll be able to tuck into a smorgasbord of bagel classics like Salmon Lox, Reuben, BLT and BEC. Keep it simple with just cream cheese or try something insane, like The Elvis, filled with peanut butter, banana and bacon.
Best of lox to it!
You can find The Little Bagel Co. at 80 Queens Rd, Bristol BS8 1QU.