STUDIO CITY : Once-Popular Bakery Closes After 27 Years

The empty shelves behind the counter bore witness to the sad truth: The bakery half of Weby’s Bakery and Dely has gone out of business after 27 years.

The bakery, a community fixture, closed on July 3, but as late as Monday, customers were still reacting with surprise and dismay at seeing the barren display cases.

“What happened to the bakery?” they demanded of Frank Ready, who co-owns the deli counter across the aisle from the bakery. The two separately owned businesses shared a storefront on Ventura Boulevard just west of Laurel Canyon Boulevard.

The bakery was a victim of the slow economy, the migration of longtime customers and changing eating habits, said Gary Schwartz, 54, who bought the business from Ruben Weber, the original Weby, in 1977.

“It’s become, not by design, a nonprofit organization in the last three years,” Schwartz said wryly.

Ready said that Viktor Benes’ Continental Bakery, which runs the bakery in the Encino Gelson’s Market, will be taking over the opposite counter at the beginning of next month.

But the building owner, David Raznick, said that Benes’ is just one of three companies with whom he is negotiating to decide who will run the new bakery. “It’s coming back,” Raznick said, “It will properly be back in by the next month.” Raznick is Weber’s son-in-law.

Longtime customers said that Weby’s Bakery, which was known for its special-occasion cakes, will be missed.

“When we were little we used to get birthday cakes here,” said Studio City resident Robin Gepner, as another customer, Linda Silver, nodded.

“Everybody in Studio City seemed to come here for bakery stuff,” said Florence Omens, a North Hollywood homemaker. “It’s like an old friend.”

“It’s kind of a shock to me; they’d been there so long,” said Alan Fried, who said he had bought breads and cakes there since the original owner opened the place in 1967.

“I aged with them,” he said.

Schwartz once did a bustling trade with the nearby CBS, ABC, Warner Bros. and Disney studios, and he counted Mary Tyler Moore and Sally Field among his customers. In recent years, he said, it appeared to him that the studios were getting less production work, and his business declined.

“It was kind of sad, but life goes on,” Schwartz said. “We’ll do what we have to do and move on to other things.”