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09
Apr
What has happened to The Secret Bakery in Harrogate and Knaresborough?
Until a few months ago, there were three businesses trading under the Secret Bakery name in Harrogate and Knaresborough.
There were shops next to the train station on Station Parade and on Knaresborough Road in Harrogate and on Market Place in Knaresborough.
But there have been significant changes this year.
The train station bakery was repossessed by bailiffs in February, as previously reported by the Stray Ferret and is no longer trading.
The Knaresborough store has changed its name to 2B Coffee House and is under the new ownership of Murat Baydu.
But the shop on Knaresborough Road continues to trade under the Secret Bakery name.
According to public records journal The Gazette, JJ Spencer Ltd, which traded as The Secret Bakery on Knaresborough Road, appointed liquidators on November 26 last year.
A resolution to wind-up the company was approved the same day by director James Spencer.
A statement of affairs published on Companies House said the company owed £43,138 to eight creditors, with energy companies accounting for a significant part of the sum.
The Stray Ferret asked Mr Spencer about the situation this week.
He said:
We sold the Knaresborough shop to concentrate on the two in Harrogate as it wasn’t making enough money.
Northern Rail wanted nearly 20% of our turnover in the station shop and we couldn’t agree to that, so they repossessed the building.
2B Coffee House in Knaresborough
We asked how the remaining business on Knaresborough Road was still operating following the appointment of liquidators.
Mr Spencer said although The Secret Bakery remained the trading name, the business was now run by a new company called Castle Café, of which he is a director.
Mr Spencer said it had been a difficult time for the business, and he had wanted to renew the lease on the Harrogate train station business:
Bills are just astronomically high. We were overstaffed at the station shop at the beginning too, so we were paying more money than we needed to be.
We’re determined to manage our last shop better.
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