Iyengar Bakeries are to Bangalore, what Irani cafes are to Mumbai. Famous for their honey cakes, cream cakes, butter biscuits, vanilla cream birthday cakes and freshly baked breads, Iyengar Bakeries are woven into the warp and weave of this city. Many a sweet tooth of old Bangaloreans can vouch for the goodies-with-a-homely-feel from Iyengar bakeries. Once landmarks of this city, today they are struggling to survive in a world filled with hi-tech pastry shops and cup-cake factories.

There are around 500 Iyengar bakeries in Bangalore, but only around 20 are original. “Most of the others are people who learnt the trade from us,” says H T Sreenivas whose great-great-grandfather started the first Iyengar bakery, the BB Bakery, in the city in 1898.

H S Thirumalachar was a Vaishnava Iyengar from one of the Ashtagrama villages in Hassan district. He opened a sweet shop on Chikpet Main Road, opposite the Mahantara Matha. “My grandmother used to tell us that an Englishman from West End Hotel who used to visit the area was a regular at the shop,” says Sreenivas. “He taught my grandfather how to bake bread during the 1890s and that’s how our family got into baking.” BB Bakery became a benchmark. Soon other Iyengars from the Ashtagrama villages came to Bangalore looking for a job and they invariably followed Thirumalachar’s road-to-success. Surya Bakery opposite Kapali theatre, the now closed MB Bakery in Malleswaram and many Iyengar Bakeries sprung up in Jayangar, Rajajinagar and other places across the city.

BB Bakery was later shifted to AM Lane parallel to the Chickpet Main Road in 1973. “It was a residential area then,” recalls Sreenivas, sitting at the counter of the 10’x10’ bakery, wrapped in a rich aroma of butter biscuits, freshly baked buns and pista cakes. To this day, BB bakery is popular for its tiny buns; in the beginning the buns would be 2” in diameter, today they are an inch bigger, but still weigh the same 45 gms. Even now, old-timers come looking for the bun.

In the 70s BB Bakery would sell around 45kgs of bread and over 40kgs of buns generating an income of Rs.3,000-5,000 per day. Today, they sell about 11-13 kgs of bread, 20kgs of buns and earn around Rs. 5,000-6,000 per day. It’s not just BB Bakery that is ailing other Iyengar bakeries too are on the decline.

Earlier most Iyengar bakeries, like BB Bakery, were located in residential areas, which have now morphed into commercial zones. That means no more children coming straight to the bakery after school to get their regular puffs and cakes; or parents ordering vanilla cream birthday cake from the neighbourhood Iyengar bakery. “Now only shopkeepers come here,” says Sreenivas. “Additionally, the increase in prices of raw materials (in 1970s, 90kgs of maida cost Rs 135, today 50kg maida costs Rs. 1,260) and labour shortage have led to lower returns.”

Labour problems seem to be the bane of these bakeries. Owners complain that workers demand hefty salaries, holidays and food expenses. “They interview us instead of us interviewing them,” says Sreenivas. “They expect us to oblige to all their demands. They ask us for specific list of raw materials… But we are old-school bakers who believe in a certain way of working.“ Today BB Bakery is also embroiled in a legal tussle; a case between Sreenivas, and the landlord is pending in the court. “We have been increasing the rent every year by 5 per cent and currently we are paying Rs. 10, 939 per month. But we have been asked to vacate, if we win the case, the bakery will continue working, else it will shut down,” says Sreenivas. “Earlier there was goodwill between the landlord and the tenant. Today it’s all about money. For our shop, in today’s time, the deposit amount will be Rs. 20 lakhs and rent Rs.20,000. If I lose the court case and have to look for another shop, I will have to invest Rs. 30-40 lakhs to start again,” says Sreenivas. He is not convinced about “starting all over again”.

Labour issues also led to the downfall of the 30-year-old Iyengar Bakery in 3rd Block, Jayanagar. They pulled their shutters down for the last time in April this year. Owner Venkatesh and his family members gave their regular customers a thank you letter.

Closeby is Janardhan aka Puttanna’s Iyengar Bakery located on Kanakpura Road, which was started in 1977. Janardhan came to Bangalore in 1965, as a 12-year-old to study. “In those days, families were big and all of us Iyengars from Ashtagrama villages came to Bangalore looking for a job,” recalls Janardhan. Once he finished his pre-university and saved some money working in a horticulture organisation, Janardhan opened his bakery. Since then, Janardhan has been coming every day to his bakery by 7 am to start the day’s work. “We mix 50 kgs of maida for all the items – buns, breads, biscuits and cakes. Work goes on till 3 pm when the cakes and other items are ready. By next day noon all these get sold and the cycle goes on.” Janardhan says he is lucky that his son Prashanth has joined him in the business. But that’s not the case with the other Iyengar bakeries. “My brother is an engineer and he is happy working in an MNC. He does not want to take up the family business,” says Ranganath, who now takes care of his father Krishnamurthy’s Iyengar bakery next to Cool Joint in Jayanagar 4th block. Ranganath, a graduate, worked in an MNC for two years. “But ten years ago, I decided I wanted to help my father, so I took it up.”

Plush jobs in MNCs and easy life has lured many young Iyengar boys to take up different careers, feel the elders. “My cousin RR Koushik owns Surya Iyengar bakery; his son, Mayur is settled in Singapore and earns more than a lakh per month. Why would he want to come back and work in a bakery?” asks Sreenivasa who has three daughters. “My second daughter wanted to take it up, but I discouraged her. It’s not an easy business; especially dealing with labourers, supervising the kitchen and at times doing all the work by yourself if the workers don’t turn up, which is more often than not. I didn’t want any of my daughters to take it up.”

Today, there are only 20 original Iyengar bakeries in the city and patrons like 38-year-old Rajesh K M, a regular at BB Bakery, are dwindling. “I have been coming to them since the time I was seven years old,” says Rajesh. For every Rajesh there are scores of others who prefer the avant-garde bakeries, pastry shops and cupcake outlets that dot our city. “I’d rather go to a modern pastry shop that is spacious, neat and clean. They also serve innovative items. I don’t like going to Iyengar bakeries because their goodies are sometimes stale. In some places they don’t even serve egg puffs and cutlets,” says P Sharath, an advertising professional. (Iyengars being vegetarians do not consume eggs. So while Thirumalachar’s bakery became famous for buns and cakes, he had never tasted the goods of his shop during his lifetime. Even today in most Iyengar bakeries quality checking is usually done by the workers).

Increasing costs, labour problems, younger generation shunning the business and young clientele’s preference for modern outlets have sounded the death knell for Iyengar bakeries. Looks like even proxy Iyengar bakeries cannot breathe a fresh lease of life into these ageing Bangalore icons.