Bibbs comes back!
by Norm Wheeler
Sun editor
After a two year absence, Bibbs Market returns to Glen Arbor. Remember when Brian and Marcie Hester got permission back in 1994 from Bill Maclachlan to build a pole barn (the one that is now Sleeping Bear Woodworks) next to Old School so they could sell fruits and vegetables? And then they weren’t here in 1995, remember? And then in 1996 they were back again, that time in what is now the T-shirt and retail shop at Cherry Republic. Then remember how in 1997 they gravitated back to Old School and put the sides on the pole barn they’d originally built? Well, in 1998 Linda Ihme bought the Glen Arbor Farm Market from Dan Weisen across from the tennis courts, and Bibbs moved in there. By that time Brian and Marcie felt like our own local Bedouins or Okies, yearly nomads looking for an oasis. Linda was fixing to expand her Leelanau Vacation Rentals business into the farm market space, so Hesters hitched up their Conestoga wagon yet again to move on. They saw an opportunity and bought the Manitou Farm Market on M-22 up near Leland (by the Good Harbor Winery). And there they finally hunkered down.
During the winter Brian saw an empty space in the Mercantile building in Glen Arbor and, as Hester clearly abhors a vacuum, he moved in. Says Brian: “We’re here for the long haul!” Jessie Hester, the oldest daughter, runs the Glen Arbor Bibbs. They still run the Manitou Farm Market, where all baking and sandwich operations occur. Every day they deliver fresh bread (including pumpkin and banana), pies, cookies, brownies, donuts, pastries, rolls, and other assorted goodies. They also have preserves, local maple syrup and honey, and in-season fruits: strawberries, cherries, peaches, and apples.
“We’re thrilled to be back in town,” Brian adds. “The last couple of years we just maintained a donut case at the Leelanau Coffee Roasters and a baked goods case at Anderson’s IGA because we knew we would eventually be back and we didn’t want people to forget us.” All of the Hester children work at the Manitou Farm Market , so it’s “a true Mom & Pop operation.” They were awarded the prize for “best cinnamon twists in the county” by an area tabloid, and those will be available in Glen Arbor now too. “We often sell 1000 a day!” Brian reports. They also sell up to 150 pies/day up there, and now we’ll be able to taste them down here.
Oh yeah, remember when Brian Hester was nailed one night point blank in the face by a skunk when Bibbs was located across from the tennis courts? (See GA Sun, issue 5, 1998) “Ever since then my nose has been on steroids,” Brian laughs. He recently smelled cigar smoke while driving north with his windows up along M-22, and when he passed Sonny Swanson’s fruit stand by Sugarloaf many minutes later, there stood a man next to a Lincoln, “puffin’ a big cigar!” When you find the aroma of a delicious Bibbs pie irresistible, imagine what it does to Brian Hester!