SOUTH JORDAN – Last year, in the first week of the COVID-19 shutdown and after an earthquake in the Salt Lake Valley, local baker Steve Borg decided he wanted to help a struggling community.
So, he created the Free Bread Project. Anyone who entered Schmidt’s Pastry Cottage would receive two loaves of bread for free – one for themselves and one to give to a neighbor. The idea was to encourage customers to check on their neighbors who might have stayed at home during the pandemic.
“It was to help people who are stuck at home and, you know, they couldn’t go out and ask their neighbors to check it out,” he explained.
Borg was not sure how long the project would take, but 365 days later he is still going strong. Since then, the bakery has distributed more than 120,000 loaves of bread for free.
“We just keep doing this. And as we continue, we know that more and more people probably didn’t need the bread, but I felt like we were still in a pandemic, ”said Borg. “My clients have kept me in business for 45 years and I felt, as long as I could do that, I would repay them and just do it as long as I could until it was over.”
At 68, Borg said that there are not many practical service projects he can undertake, especially during a pandemic. Giving out bread for free was his way of serving the community, he said. He hopes that others will be inspired to find creative ways to give back in their communities.
“If everyone helps and reciprocates, it will help us in this long, long year,” he said.
It was a difficult year for business at the bakery, considering that events like office parties or weddings that normally attract customers were not happening. The bakery managed to stay open and relied on its loyal customers during the pandemic to stay afloat, said Borg.
If only a handful of families had been helped during that time, Borg said the entire free bread project would have been worthwhile.
Going forward, Borg said he hopes to keep the program for as long as necessary and as long as he can afford it.
“We felt that this was giving us a little happiness, a little good in life,” he said.
Correction: An earlier version said that Schmidt’s Pastry Cottage is located in western Jordan. The bakery actually has two locations: one in South Jordan and one in Taylorsville.