All in the Bagel Family for Stacie's

It seems quite natural that Stacie Shapiro owns a bagel store.

When her father owned Strathmore Bagels, Shapiro worked in the store after attending classes at Sachem High School and when she came home from college.

"I grew up in the bagel store," she said.

Indeed.

"When my dad sold his store in 1999 I wasn't ready to give my life up to own a bagel store," Shapiro said. "He wanted me to have that. I didn't want it. So six months later after working for other people, I decided, 'You know what, I loved the bagel store.' We found this bagel store to buy."

That store is located at 416 Hawkins Ave. in Hawkins Plaza in Ronkonkoma: Stacie's Bagels.

"Going to high school and to college, I loved it, but I loved this more," she said.

Shapiro, a 1992 Sachem graduate, and her family have greeted early risers and other hungry residents to breakfast and lunch. The bagel store has become a Ronkonkoma staple -- during busy weekday mornings and Saturday mornings the line has snaked out the door -- even though Stacie's Bagels fell out of the public eye and stomach not once, but twice.

Yet, both times the business came back strong.

After they were forced to close for nine months due to a collapsed roof in 2009, Shapiro discovered how much their customers loved Stacie's Bagels.

"They told me they missed me a lot," she said. "When I re-opened, it was 'Thank God you're back.' It was a good feeling that you have so many people who rely on you. It's a horrible feeling to know that they can't rely on you because you're not there. I felt horrible for the customers that come in every single day for their buttered bagel and their coffee. For a $1.50 you can't get that anywhere. These people are on a fixed budget. I understand it. Times are rough."

In 2007, Shapiro sold Stacie's to new owners. But things did not work out, business fell off and the owners defaulted on their note.

"I had to take it back," she said. "They lost about 80 percent of my business that I sold them. It was a good place. It's a family place and the people get used to the family.

"They stopped paying the note every month. Instead of telling me, 'I need help,' [and] maybe I can come back and see what's going on, they just didn't pay the note. My lawyer told me all I can do is take the store back or resell it. If I resold it, they would still have to repay a note. So how are they going to build it up if people don't like what was going on there to begin with?"

Stacie returned and so did the customers.

Another challenge came in June 2009, when the roof caved in on the 60-year-old building as bricks and the front sign fell down. Customers were in the store at the time, but nobody got hurt. While the Town of Brookhaven mulled the fate of the building, Stacie faced some difficult decisions.

Should she stay or find a new spot? Could she find new space within a reasonable distance from the old store? And would it have ample parking as Hawkins Plaza?

"The big problem was that the town didn't know if they were going to keep the building standing or they were going to knock the building down," Shapiro said. "That was the big hold-up."

"The insurance company asked me if I wanted to relocate. I would have relocated if they would have guaranteed me the parking, the right traffic. If you up and down Hawkins Avenue, there are no other places that have this much parking and don't already have a food establishment in it."

Shapiro said the other option was to go onto Ronkonkoma Avenue -- not to leave the area because people are creatures of habit. Stacie and her parents had nothing to do for nine months.

"It seemed like forever," she said.

"After the shock wore off, we kind of lived a little because we never really had a day off, a weekend off. So it went from working every day to not doing anything to trying to make the best of it, trying to do things we never got a chance to do. Go out for breakfast. My parents have a house in Florida and they got to go there at least once a month."

The store re-opened on April 1.

"And no, it wasn't a fool. It wasn't a joke," Shapiro said with a laugh.

Well, some of the customers joked about it.

"when we reopened, people were coming and they were like, 'Do we need hard hats?' They were teasing. Everybody was just happy. It was like a big family."

Due to water damage, everything in the store was replaced, from the oven to the counters to the tables.

Business came back quickly. The store accommodates between 400-500 customers a day, Shapiro said.

Shapiro, 36, is a morning person, a very early morning person. The store is open seven days a week and except for vacations, and Shapiro is there to open and close it. Counting her parents, Stephanie and Lenny, nine people work at Stacie's.

A typical day begins with Shapiro rising at 3 a.m. to get to the store by 4 a.m. The store doesn't open until 5:30 a.m. (it closes at 3 p.m.), although one customer will get his breakfast a little earlier than usual.

"My first customer comes in around quarter after four," Shapiro said. "He's a delivery man, so he's on his way to work. He has a bagel, a cup of coffee."

The bagels -- and there are many, many varieties of them, ranging from the basic plain to cinnamon raison to French toast -- are baked on the premises. The dough is made there as well.

The oven is on a timer and it takes a good 30-40 minutes to heat up. The dough has to be made, panned and baked.

"There is a lot of work in-between that. A lot of people that come in here think we turn the key and boom, everything's done," Shapiro added with a laugh. "There's a lot of prep in the morning to do."

The most popular items on the menu?

Well, bagels, eggs and coffee top the list; the big specialty item is coffee and a bagel for $1.49. But there are plenty of other items, including muffins, pastries. During Passover, Stacie's makes Matzos brie.

If you're watching your weight or want something healthier, you can have Stacie's Omelet with egg whites and vegetables and/or a multi-grain bagel.

"There's a little bit of everything for somebody," Shapiro said.

While it is a bagel place, the store also serves cold cuts, sandwiches and soup, the latest addition, for lunch. The soup varieties include split pea, calm chowder, chicken noodle, beef vegetable with barley, Italian wedding and Tomato Florentine.

"They're all delicious," Shapiro said.

Shapiro's personal favorite item? A cinnamon raison bagel.

"But it has to be hot, with a little bit of low fat vegetable cream cheese and chicken salad," she said. "I'm a mixer, so I like to mix everything. I like everything. The French toast bagels are phenomenal. They literally smell like French toast. They come out of the oven and just smell the whole place. I have a sweet tooth and everything here is good to me."

And apparently to a whole host of people in Ronkonkoma as well.