Saif Manna used to sell cookies from his off-campus apartment. Now he runs Manna Bakery in Fishtown, employing a staff of 20.
Saif Manna, who studied political science at Temple, stands behind the counter at Manna Bakery on West Berks Street in Fishtown, where a dozen scratch-made pastries are on display for customers.
Photo by Ryan S. Brandenberg
Walk into Manna Bakery in Fishtown and peer over the pastry counter, and you immediately see a dozen deliciously looking baked goods spread across, laying on a long piece of parchment paper and sitting close enough to smell before you’ve decided what you want.
There is the loaded Baba’s Fuul Manakeesh, the rich extra brown butter chocolate chunk cookie, the savory mushroom cheese fatayer, za’atar manoushe, traditional Jerusalem bagels and more. Each offering is crafted like a work of art. Every bite pays homage to Palestine, the ancestral home of owner Saif Manna.
“I started cooking at the age of 8,” said Manna, CLA ’22, who majored in political science. “I’ve been thinking about cooking and running my own business all my life.”
He said he’s using lessons learned from undergrad to bake up a thriving pastry business, which he started from his college apartment.
For instance, an international organizations capstone taught by Professor Orfeo Fioretos, which included a 30-page research paper that required him to master storytelling.
“Communicating very clearly to your audience is necessary for you to get your point across. Doing that with storytelling is what I learned to do and what I still do, today,” he said.
Manna put that lesson into practice by writing short, personalized stories on the parchment paper underneath his pastries. One written where Baba’s Fuul Manakeesh sits reads: “I never loved Fuul, until baba made it for me. This is his recipe.”
“That tells a customer a short story that basically says, this is a family recipe. So you know it’s going to be good,” he said.
A Temple political science grad uses lessons learned from his undergrad to bake up a thriving pastry business in Fishtown.
Photo by Ryan S. Brandenberg
Everything in the bakery is made from scratch, including the syrups that go into the coffee and lattes, which change with the seasons.
“We’re a bakery-cafe; bakery first, cafe second,” Manna said. “But that doesn’t mean we put our coffee second. We take pride in everything that we serve, including the coffee.”
The recently opened storefront is Manna’s first brick-and-mortar, and it took five years of understanding baking and business to get there.
“Temple’s motto is Perseverance Conquers. My career journey is an example of that,” he said.
Manna, who was born in California and grew up in Dubai, transferred to Temple from a university in Texas because he wanted to live in a city.
In 2021, his junior year at Temple, Manna was baking in his apartment at The Nest at Broad and Master streets. With an entrepreneurial spirit that’s been growing since he was a child, he wanted to take the first real step towards his dream of running a business and set up a table outside to sell cookies.
“I didn’t sell anything,” he said.
Still, his then girlfriend (who he later married) insisted his baking was something special. So, he looked for better locations on campus and the cookies began to sell. He then connected with nearby cafés. That turned out to be a big hit.
“They were like, ‘Oh, this is going great. We’d love to have you here on a weekly basis,’” he said. “And that sort of started the whole pop-up thing.”
Manna kept selling through his senior year, setting up pop-up shops at farmers’ markets, and continuing to sell in cafes. Customers from around Philadelphia started finding him, and some suggested he open his own cafe. And Manna was baking cookies every chance he could get. Between classes and late nights and after graduating, he put even more time into the business.
The recently opened storefront is Manna’s first brick-and-mortar, and it took five years of understanding baking and business to get there.
Photo by Ryan S. Brandenberg
“The hours were long. I used to work 18, sometimes 20-hour days,” he said. “It was a lot of time on your feet.”
For years, that’s how Manna did business. His cookies began to sell quickly wherever he went, and the Manna Bakery brand gained popularity. He gradually expanded his menu to include a wider variety of baked goods and hired his first employees.
“You don’t see results in a month or two, and not even in a year or two,” he said. “It takes a long time. So it takes a lot of patience and perseverance.”
Looking to have a permanent location, Manna sought a flexible commercial space capable of housing a full-scale bakery, coffee bar and an event venue. He found the right fit in a former Fishtown coffee shop not far from Main Campus. The bakery opened its doors on June 30, with an expanded team of around 20 employees.
Though his background is in political science, Manna credits this Temple education with shaping his business strategy.
“At Temple, I learned about effective communication. That is so important when running a business, because you have to clearly communicate with customers, with your employees, with wholesalers,” he said.
His advice to current students is to adapt, have goals and build a skill set.
“Your major doesn’t define your future,” he said. “What really matters is identifying the core skills you gain as a student and honing them as much as possible. That’s what will help to build a successful career.”
Manna Bakery is at 110 W. Berks St. and is open Thursday through Sunday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
