Nearly six years after Mission Local first reported that the Richmond District’s Cinderella Bakery intended to open up in the vacated La Victoria Bakery spot in the Mission District, the Russian bakery will finally start serving its piroshkis, borscht and pelmenis: Cinderella will open on 24th Street by the end of the year, according to its owner.
“We’re very excited to be part of the community,” said Mike Fishman, who co-owns Cinderella Bakery with his wife, Marika Fishman. He did not give a specific opening date, but said the business is in the final stages of permitting. “We look forward to being a positive addition to the neighborhood.”
For more than 70 years, Cinderella has been serving Russian goods to San Franciscans at 436 Balboa St. in the Inner Richmond. In 2017, the bakery was recognized as a legacy business. It has been in the Richmond since 1953.
The road from the Richmond District to the Mission proved far more complex than a 20-minute bus ride on the 33-Ashbury bus, however. In November 2018, Fishman bought the building at 2937 24th St. for about $3 million, hoping to open up a Cinderella Bakery where La Victoria, a neighborhood institution that had operated since 1951, had recently closed.
In its final years, La Victoria got caught up in a family feud. Jaime Maldonado, who had taken over the business from his father, Gabriel Maldonado, and who was the master tenant of the space, served an eviction notice to the subtenants whom he had hired to operate La Victoria. He did so to comply with a lawsuit settlement with the person controlling the family’s trust, his stepmother, Susan Maldonado.
La Victoria vacated in October of 2018. Fishman bought it the following month.
Fishman’s intention to replace Mexican baked goods with Russian pastries was met with resistance from some Mission activists, who demanded the new owner let La Victoria return to its home of 68 years.
One of the loudest voices in opposition was Calle 24, which called for a boycott of the new business through its president, Erick Arguello.
Arguello has since changed his tune. “I don’t want to look back,” he said on Monday, declining to elaborate on the previous resistance. “I just want to look forward. Everything is fine. … The important thing is that they’ve integrated into the community.”
The two other businesses in the building, Texas Jewelry and Gemini Barber, which have been there since Fishman bought the property, will be able to stay, he said.
Arguello said the business adhered to conditional use requirements for new businesses in the 24th Street Cultural District, one of 10 such districts across the city. The 24th Street district covers the stretch from Mission Street to Potrero Avenue.
Each of San Francisco’s cultural districts has its own set of conditions. For 24th Street, those mandates apply to any new businesses occupying a space formerly held by a legacy business, or seeking a change of use. Those businesses must adopt at least four out of six conditions that seek to “preserve the prevailing neighborhood character” of the area, like having partnerships with local groups or supporting the “production or offerings of local or Latino artwork.”
Cinderella Bakery accepted more than four of those conditions, Arguello said.
Fishman said he hired Precita Eyes to paint a mural on the Alabama Street side of the business. He will also relocate employees who are currently working in the Richmond District but live closer to the 24th Street location. This will ease their commute. He’ll open the space for local art shows and exhibits, he added.
“I’m a man of my word,” he said. “We’re going to honor that.”
Fishman has no plans of closing the Richmond District location, and said the menu at the Mission outpost will stay the same as the original Cinderella.
Great news! Cinderella Bakery will be an outstanding addition to the 24th Street corridor.
I loved La Victoria, and the neighborhood is going to love Cinderella. The Fishman’s are good people.
Leave it to Calle 24 to protest a tiny, local, family-owned business opening up. Happy they changed their tune, or whatever, but they need to relax on the whole “integrating into the community” song and dance.
Why would we???
So nice to hear that this is finally happening!
I am pleased that they will be able to open, but the episode just shows how dysfunctional San Francisco is. There is no reason some random non-profit should be able to prevent a legitimate business from opening. There is no evidence that Erick Arguello represents anyone other than himself.
Only in SF is it important and surprising news that a bakery went out of business and another bakery managed to jump through the hoops necessary to replace it.
Multiple small business owners and community members I’ve spoken to have explicitly or implicitly stated that Calle 24 is one of the most difficult groups to work with, and is actively getting in the way of the Mission’s development. Glad that Cinderella was able to fight back and work towards opening this location. Excited for the honey cakes and dumplings!
Can’t wait!!
ooooh, i love that bakery. used to live in Western Addition and take long walks to Ocean Beach. always stopped for piroshkis and honey cake and more often than not a beef stroganoff to take home. 10+ years later and i’m still drooling just thinking about the stroganoff.
First of all, I would like to congratulate Oscar Palma for writing such a thorough story on a very contentious, and somewhat racially motivated story that began back in 2018, excellently told to us at that time by Mission Locals own Joe Eskenazi. Oscar has been abel to update us on a sad time. A time when a businessman invested over 3 million dollars of his own money to expand into the Mission and bring a different palate to our neighbors. Let me start out by stating that I have always been in favor of Mr. Fishman opening up at the corner of 24th and Alabama. Nothing good had been coming out of that location for quite sometime. Not only that, but when I heard the rumor that some Russian restaurant may be moving in: Great! I had never been to his other location, and I still haven’t tried it, but I must admit I’m looking forward to the day that they open. I believe that diversity is a good thing. So is competition, and so is acceptance and tolerance. Mr. Palma reached out to Erick Arguello the former leader of Calle 24 back in the begining of all this, and asked him about what he thinks of Cinderella Bakery. Well, to me, I believe issue may not be over. His response was something like He doesn’t look back and it’s over and done. There was no stating that maybe looking back my group and I were wrong and maybe we should not have been so petty and closed minded, and we welcome into our community, and wish him well….
Not even close.
There is a quote about leadership and admitting that you were wrong, and it goes something like this:
“All leaders make mistakes: they’re a part of life. But successful leaders recognize their errors, learn from them, and work to correct their faults”.
Obviously, that’s not happening here. I would encourage you, the readers to also read Eskanazi’s backstory that has been included, and read what Calle 24 stated back then, and also read the readers comments that they submitted. The quotes from Calle 24 back then sound very Trumpian today. They screamed about excluding any and all businesses that had owners that did not come from a Spanish speaking country, or if you bought a building you could only put a Hispanic business in there. Even today, if I read the latest update correctly, the new owner must comply with Calle 24s demands. After all these years of investment, and upgrades, to open up his business in The Mission, he is forced to agree to Calle 24s demand to sell latin art and products in his RUSSIAN RESTAURANT AND DELLI.
Who does that?
Thankfully, even in 2018 the majority of readers did not agree with Arguello and his organization. I am hopeful that after the last 100 days we have seen what hate and prejudice creates. I have lived in The Mission almost eighty years. Obviously I have witnessed many changes. Some good, some not so good. But when I want to go eat something on 24th Street, I don’t always want a pupusa, and I should not be mandated to go find some hummus in The Ingleside. We have a Jewish Deli, and we have survived. Now we’re about to have a Russian restaurant and the results should be the same. Only hate and a few bitter people could ruin that. Let’s be better than that….
I’ll see all of you at Cinderella’s.
So calle 24 gets to decide whether a business can open in a neighborhood? Seems…problematic
Yup, it’s always been like that, before Calle 24 it was up to the 24th street merchants. You see, we in SF try to keep the enrichment of the neighborhoods easy to shop for, In the Mission you can buy all spanish products, in chinatown etc.., Bay view/3rd St, etc…even on clement vietnamese?? and The Aves keep it Russian. It’s worked so far!
That’s called the Mafia.
Fantastic news! Can’t wait to welcome them to the neighborhood.
Welcome to the neighborhood!
Shameful that Cinderella Bakery was opposed by some local “progressive” advocates. The Mission is not just one ethnicity, but is quite diverse and always has been. We should welcome new businesses. It would be very nice if 24th Street were as vibrant as Cortland in Bernal Heights.
The MISSION is just that and YES HAS ALWAYS BEEN one ethnicity the LATINO COMMUNITY. Bernal heights was a part of that but then GENTERFICATION came around and “hollywood” writers , producers and production workers took over both bernal & Noe valley and so those fancy restaurants and shops jumped on the bandwagon looked at your wallets and now YOU are served little food on your plates, the restaurants pay the same price for vegetables and spices and over charge YOU “suckers”
That’s why your running to the LATIN COMMUNITY for a bomb burrito for 10$$$$$
STRAIGHT SAN FRAN MISSION!
The Mission started out as an Irish neighborhood in the late 1800’s.
And was primarily Irish into the 1950s, though with a lot of other folks as well. Highly recommend “Latinos at the Golden Gate” on this period of (relatively recent!) transition, which includes brief discussion of La Victoria: https://uncpress.org/book/9781469627267/latinos-at-the-golden-gate/
So the public sector, government, mandates that prospective businesses kiss the asses of private nonprofits as a condition of a permitted as of right land use because cultural district?
It will close soon after opening due to crime.
Gimme a break. La Victoria has been selling pastries on 24th Street since 1951, and they never closed due to “crime.” Are you new to the neighborhood? Because “crime” in the Mission has a very long and violent history, and if La Victoria managed to carry on in the face of the worst of it in the 70s and 80s, I don’t think we have to worry about Cinderella Bakery failing in the 2020s with drastically reduced crime rates. Maybe try to scare some children, folks here are familiar with the neighborhood’s history.