TORONTO — Waking up early in the morning with his four-year-old daughter, Martin Connell occupied his time by playing with dough. The art of shaping the perfect rustic baguette became a hobby: He received bread books for his birthday, built an outdoor wood-burning bake oven at his country house in Caledon and bought a small commercial mixer.
"They were pretty lousy, but everybody said nice things about them," Mr. Connell said of his baguettes.
What started with a little outdoor oven has led to the biggest and best-known artisan bread maker in the city, Ace Bakery. And now, after 15 years, Mr. Connell and his wife, Linda Haynes, have sold it to Glencoe Capital, a Chicago-based private equity firm.
"Fifteen years is a long run. We both have been at it for that length of time and we're at a stage in our lives now where we have other interests," Mr. Connell, 66, said in an interview yesterday. Neither he nor his wife would reveal how much Glencoe paid.
Ace Bakery was born out of a trip to New York. So interested was Mr. Connell, an oil and gas executive, in artisan breads that his wife surprised him for his 50th birthday with a trip to two top bakeries, where he could watch and learn the process of making that mouth-watering bread with its moist, chewy texture and crisp crust.
The bakery started in a King Street West retail store during a slump in Toronto's economy. Ms. Haynes wasn't fazed because, although people would forgo vacations or new cars during tough times, they would still treat themselves to a loaf of European-style bread.
The company started delivering bread to restaurants across the city. And the introduction of par-baking bread (partially baking the bread and flash-freezing it) meant it could be shipped across the province, to the United States and even the Bahamas.
"It just took off," said Ms. Haynes, 60. "We were just so, so lucky."
Aside from their baking business, the husband-and-wife team focused on charity work. When the company began, a portion of its pretax profits went to Calmeadow, an organization they formed to provide microfinancing to entrepreneurs in developing nations. With Calmeadow becoming self-sufficient, the pretax profits went toward organic farming, culinary scholarships and food and nutrition programs in the regions where Ace Bakery does business. Mr. Connell doesn't know if this will continue under the new owners. Telephone calls to Glencoe were not returned yesterday.
Mr. Connell, chair of the Toronto Community Foundation, said he will now focus on philanthropy. Ms. Haynes, a former TV producer, is working on her third cookbook with her 23-year-old daughter, Devin Connell.
As for trying his hand at making baguettes at home again, Mr. Connell chuckled at the notion. "Once you've made a hobby a business," he said, "it's very hard to go back. ... I don't think I could do it as well, that's the problem."
