Andy Tullis / The BulletinDick Robertson explains the features Wednesday of Busy Chef, a commercial kitchen he and his business partners created in Redmond.

Randi Holm became popular once she moved the family business, Holm Made Toffee, to NE First Street earlier this year, and not just because customers loved the toffee.

Other entrepreneurs started knocking on her door, asking whether she’d lease time on her commercial kitchen, she said. They were out of luck, Holm said, because her business needs the kitchen all day.

“Bend has a really big need (for commercial kitchen space),” she said. “I always say that if I had more money and more time, I’d open, like, a kitchen that people could rent out.”

Dick Robertson, of Robertson & Price LLC, a Redmond property developer, had the same thought. He and his partners spent $100,000 turning a former strip club, Big T’s, on SW Glacier Avenue in Redmond, into Busy Chef a commercial kitchen and event space. It opened in May.

Other than a handful of users and a steady schedule of wedding receptions and quinceañeras, however, the business hasn’t taken off the way Robertson expected. The demand is there, he said. Some commercial kitchens in Bend, he said, lease space to small businesses 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

“We’d be happy with 16 hours a day, seven days a week,” he said.

Justine Haney, of Justy’s Jelly, a Redmond maker of small-batched jellies, grew her business in another Robertson & Price property, a small kitchen in a converted garage on NW Cedar Avenue. The larger kitchen on NW Glacier Avenue is ideal for startups looking to move out of their home kitchens, she said Wednesday. Robertson said he charges $20 to $30 per hour.

“Even if I got into a jam and needed a stove,” Haney said, “I’d lease it.”

Robertson said several users are sharing the kitchen now, including caterers and a maker of gluten-free dog biscuits. Busy Chef can provide space for cold and dry storage, food prep and cooking. Food-truck operators, which must associate with a commercial kitchen, would find the place useful, he said. In one instance, a woman who needed to bake 240 personal-sized cakes inside glass jars for a June wedding in Sisters found the kitchen just in time, Robertson said.

“The opportunity is endless,” he said.

A whole new class of business startups, commercial marijuana processors, contributed to the demand for commercial kitchens in Bend after adult recreational marijuana became legal in July 2015. Phyllis Swindells, co-founder of Juice Counter, a startup cold-press juice maker, said she lost her space on NE Second Street to a marijuana processor. She took time out from the business afterward, she said.

“I think ever since they made it legal all the pot guys are trying to get kitchens,” Swindells said.

Howard Friedman, a broker with Compass Commercial Real Estate Services, said he regularly fields inquiries from processors looking for commercial kitchens but his firm does not work with marijuana clients. Redmond prohibits commercial marijuana activity within city limits.

Setting up a commercial kitchen can be an expensive proposition, Friedman said. The building must meet building codes and meet individual users’ needs. For a new business, sharing a kitchen can be the way to go, Friedman said.

“Commercial kitchen equipment is not cheap,” he said, “certainly if you buy it new.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7815,

jditzler@bendbulletin.com