INSIDE

Chef to breathe life into Pier Point

Local chef Steve O’Neill is poised to revive the hibernating Pier Point property on Marine Drive with a small step: a bakery and café at the southwest corner he hopes to open by early summer.

“We’re starting our concept for the whole project here,” O’Neill said, adding he has leased the property from owner Tod Manrell who was involved as the landlord, but not as a business partner.

O’Neill said he had brought in an architect to design leasehold improvements and hoped to be applying for permits in March. The core of the first business in Pier Point will be an artisan bakery, offering daily selections of bread. “We want to do fewer breads and do a baking schedule,” he said. The café will also offer soups, sandwiches and pizzas, which O’Neill hopes will be coming out of the woodstone oven he plans to cook his bread in. “It’s ideal for fast meals,” he said.

The intention is to design a simple operation that can run with limited staff so the business doesn’t need to have seasonal fluctuations. “My goal is to offer the same level of quality and service in July as in January,” he said. “I think we’ll be opening up with a great product even though the number of seats is not great,”

The café will be a cornerstone to what O’Neill hopes will eventually be a resort destination with restaurant, a hotel component and perhaps a day spa. “It’s difficult to visualize anything being successful on a long-term basis that doesn’t involve some lodging,” O’Neill said. “The idea is to make a place where you can come and get all the things you want.”
Starting with the small café has allowed him to take the first step without financial backers, O’Neill said. “We had thought of putting in a restaurant, a big commercial kitchen for catering, but if we try and do too much too quickly, we’ll have problems,” he said.

O’Neill said he hopes a measured, creative approach will help Pier Point, which has been vacant since the old cannery was renovated eight years ago, come to life. “I like this idea, and I know it’s a little ambitious for Point Roberts, but I like it,” he said.