Breakfast, homemade baked goods and a juice bar will fill the space vacated by Rumson Market when Cups and Cakes moves in from its current location two doors down. (Photo by Jim Willis. Click to enlarge)
By JIM WILLIS
After three years on East River Road in Rumson, Denise Kelleher is ready to expand her bakery, Cups and Cakes.
She plans to take over the space two doors down left vacant when Rumson Market abruptly closed its doors in September.
Bad news for the market, but the timing couldn’t have been more perfect for Kelleher.
Denise Kelleher, owner of Cups and Cakes. (Photo by Jim Willis. Click to enlarge)
Kelleher will be renting the space from building owner Craig Cummings, who had reopened the Rumson Market three years ago after buying the building.
“The taxes were responsible for closing the business,” he says. “If I were paying employees in cash rather than having to pay the government, it would have been fine. But it is without question because of the taxes imposed by the federal and state taxes that the place is closed.”
Kelleher, who will presumably also have to pay taxes, sees the opportunity as fortuitous.
“Business has been really good. I have a really nice following,” says Kelleher. “We’ve really outgrown this space with the tiny little kitchen we have here.”
She’d been looking for space to expand, and considered Red Bank and Little Silver. But “my clientele is right here,” she says. “It’s nice that I can stay where my client base is.”
Kelleher says when she opens in the new location, she’ll have double the space, and will be able to offer seating, something her current cramped location lacks, and expand her menu a bit.
Cups and Cakes will have a decidedly breakfast-bakery focus, with the current quiche-and-frittata menu supplemented by oatmeal, fresh fruit and a juice bar.
Kelleher also does breakfast catering and dessert catering. “I’ll also have the space to offer ready-made cakes. Right now we do mostly made-to-order cakes,” she says.
Kelleher says she was hoping to be in the new space by December 15 but adds, “it may be January now. I’m waiting for permits and contractors.”
How does she thinks her custom cake business will do with the Cake Boss coming into Red Bank?
“Bring it on,” she says. “We do some really special cakes here.”
