Table of Contents
Get our free local reporting delivered straight to your inbox. No noise, no spam — just clear, independent coverage of Marblehead. Sign up for our once-a-week newsletter.
A local bagel business with roots in education and philanthropy brought its story — and its product — to Abbot Public Library this week, pairing a lighthearted gathering with a moment of uncertainty for the institution.
Grab the Bagel founder Dave Aldrich visited the library Tuesday to speak with staff, share bagels and highlight what he calls “Random Acts of Bagelness,” an outreach effort that delivers surprise bagel drops to people and organizations in the community.
The visit came at a fraught time for the library. Town officials have advanced a balanced fiscal 2027 budget ahead of Town Meeting, and library leaders have warned that without a tax override, Abbot Public Library could be reduced to three days of service per week, lose more than eight full-time equivalent positions and face significant cuts to programming, materials and access.
Against that backdrop, Aldrich described the event as a small way to offer encouragement.
“Community outreach is part of who we are,” he said, explaining that the business aims to pair its products with acts of generosity.
Aldrich’s path to bagel-making was not a traditional one. For two decades, he ran a national program teaching leadership, ethics and philanthropy to high school students. When that work was disrupted during the pandemic, he began making bagels — initially as an experiment that quickly gained a following.
Today, Grab the Bagel sells at local markets and pop-ups, with a longer-term goal of directing net operating profits toward charitable work through Aldrich’s nonprofit, Grab the Torch.
The library event reflected that mission. Attendees sampled bagels, chatted with Aldrich and learned more about the outreach program, which he said is designed to deliver small, unexpected moments of appreciation.
The gathering also featured one of the business’s newer offerings: a chocolate cookie named “The Nikolay”, for Nikolay Kuzmina, whom Aldrich said was “over the moon” after learning it had been created in his honor.
