Gâteau Baking Company will reopen with a slightly different name and a much different concept in Davidson. Photo by Elli McGuire.

​Gâteau Baking Company​ is reopening in November or December, this time as a brick-and-mortar location on Davidson’s Main Street. Locals know Gâteau​ from pop-up shops and a stall at 7th Street Public Market, where owner Cara Jorgenson sold cakes, cupcakes, and desserts. For the Davidson effort, she joins with Tara Ragan, who will run the business side of the business while Jorgenson manages the baking operation.

“I met with her and we clicked really, really well and have been working together since,” Jorgenson says of Ragan. “In that sense, my role has kind of shifted from the one end-all, be-all, everything falls on me position to more, she’s the business side of things and I’m the creative side of things.”

The new shop will be called Gâteau​ on Main, a bakery and dessert bar. Jorgenson was initially anticipating an opening date of mid-November, with a target grand opening on Saturday, Nov. 17, preceded by a soft opening. However, the opening is now looking like it will be at the end of November or early December.

In the mornings, Gâteau on Main will be a more traditional bakery, with breakfast pastries like scones and croissants. There will be a house coffee blend by Pure Intentions, available by the bag or cup. Sweeter items, like cupcakes, will start popping up on the counters around lunchtime, and in the evening, the space will serve plated desserts and wine and beer. There will also be a strawberry Lenny Boy kombucha on tap, served as is or topped with sparkling wine.

“There’s nowhere around here to grab a quick dessert and a glass of beer or wine or whatever it might be, or even just a late coffee,” Jorgenson says. “Everything seems to close early.”

It can also be awkward, she adds, to take up an entire table at a restaurant for dessert on a busy night.

The bakery is in a space formerly occupied by a candy store at 107 North Main Street, just down the street from Kindred. Its opening helped draw Jorgenson back into baking after an abrupt departure. She chronicled the conflict she faced with another vendor at the Uptown market on her blog, and she left the market feeling unheard and mistreated. She took a job in sales, and only returned to baking after a chance email from Ragan, who had seen the posts.

The two hope to create an environment where they and their employees feel welcome and fulfilled, something that they haven’t always experienced in their careers. They also believe the bakery will give them each an opportunity to be working at a job they love, and hopefully, success will follow.

“Money is not our end game,” Jorgenson says. “It’s more, how can we make this a job we love and that the people that work for us love and that Davidson loves? I think running it like that, the money will come.” —Kristen Wile