Pi Day a bakery bonanza
Tech firms celebrate math with pastries
As the sun set on the warm Monday evening before Pi Day, the Three Babes Bakeshop still had a long night ahead.
Owners Lenore Estrada and Anna Derivi-Castellanos were entering the final stretch of the pie-making marathon that precedes every Pi Day, and the fatigue was starting to set in. On a normal day, the Bayview bakery would make 15 — maybe 20 — pies. But on Monday, the exact number was far higher, and getting hard to count.
“We’re hanging in there,” said Derivi-Castellanos, 33, with a deep exhale and a tired smile.
In the cheeky spirit of Pi Day, the March 14 celebration dedicated to the number pi (3.14), many big Bay Area tech companies such as Facebook, Airbnb, Google, Reddit and Slack order dozens of pies from local bakeries to feed to their data-geek employees.
While the majority of orders come from large companies, startups and small businesses place some big orders as well. One of Three Babes Bakeshop’s biggest orders this year came from finance startup, Earnest, which
ordered 26 pies.
Earnest employees gathered at 3:14 p.m. Tuesday for a meeting at which the team — comprised of a bunch of “mathy people,” a company spokeswoman said — all ate some pie.
“Earnest prides itself on being a team of data nerds, so Pi Day is one to celebrate,” the spokeswoman said.
Engineers and coders may regularly encounter the number pi or simply just appreciate its significance. Several local bakery owners said they have noticed a significant boom in the amount of Pi Day orders over the past few years, as more and more tech companies move to the region. Some Bay Area tech workers also marked Pi Day this year by protesting the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
The bulk of Pi Day orders at Mission Pie used to come from math teachers at area high schools. But each year, the bakery on Mission Street has gradually received more orders from tech companies. This year, the bakery made about 900 pies, many of which co-owner Krystin Rubin said went to Salesforce, Uber and Google.
“Pi Day is off the charts,” Rubin said.
While Pi Day is one of the most lucrative days of the year for some bakeries, it can be a logistical nightmare.
They have to suddenly increase production and staff for just this one day in March. Landing in between winter and spring, the holiday also arrives when many popular pie fruits aren’t readily available.
After being caught by surprise with the influx of Pi Day orders six years ago, the Three Babes Bakeshop now has the holiday preparations down to a science.
The bakery buys fruits including blueberries and rhubarb in the summer, and freezes them until March. And starting a few weeks before Pi Day, the owners put out social media posts calling for volunteers to help them prepare for the rush.
Despite the preparation, Derivi-Castellanos said, there is always a last-minute scramble to meet all of the orders. On Tuesday, they would deliver more than 1,000 pies, accounting for about 5 percent of their annual revenue in one day.
But on Monday night, Estrada and Derivi-Castellanos buzzed around the bakery as their employees carefully basted the dough and checked the crusts. They still had 50 Pi Day pies to go.
“Pi Day can really take you by surprise if it isn’t on your radar, if you don’t work at a tech company or if you’re not in that scene — whatever scene that is,” DeriviCastellanos said.