Iconic cupcake sugar shop Magnolia Bakery is leaving crumbs around the world, from NYC’s West Village to the streets of Chicago, L.A., Dubai, and now, Central Valley. The franchise’s latest outpost will open tomorrow at Woodbury Common Premium Outlets, making it the first northeastern storefront outside of New York City.
The bakery will offer the same range of cupcakes, pies, cakes, cookies, and other specialty desserts as its famous sister stores, but will incorporate regional Valley ingredients into its classic crumbly recipes. You’ll find products ranging from apples to ice cream, all distributed by nearby Ancramdale’s Ronnybrook Dairy Farm, family owned Harney & Sons Teas in Millerton, upstate Red Jacket Orchards, and many more.
“We really try to focus on purchasing ingredients through local vendors, not only at our New York stores,” says Magnolia Chief Baking Officer Bobbie Lloyd. “One thing that we love about the Hudson Valley is that they’re all right here. It’s really kind of wonderful.”
Now in its 20th year of business, Magnolia has plans to expand beyond bustling streets and city storefronts, focusing more on malls and suburban areas along the eastern seaboard. While there are currently no other Valley locations in development, Lloyd says that they’re on the lookout.
“We weren’t coming up here looking for locations specifically in the Hudson Valley, but Woodbury Common, being a premium outlet mall, matched the demographic we look for in all of our other locations,” she explains. “For a store to be successful, we need to be in a community where there’s a large residential population, with some sort of tourism or entertainment, or shopping and retail. There’s a bit of everything here, and Woodbury’s really become a major destination now.”
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Magnolia will open at 9 am tomorrow within the Hudson Valley District of the 220-store outlet mall, across from Kipling. A ribbon-cutting ceremony will commence at noon, within tasting samples available throughout the day. That’s in addition to the limited-offering, Common-exclusive Shopaholic cupcake, featuring eclectic, mall-appropriate confection decorations like red lipstick.
The bakery joins six new stores at Woodbury Common, including Spanish porcelain collectible company Lladró, luxury lingerie brand Agent Provocateur, Canadian fashion house Dsquared2, and the internationally renowned styling’s of Givenchy, Marc Jacobs, and Citizen Watch Company.
