Bernie’s Pie Shoppe Rockhampton for sale after 38 years of business

Bernie and Carmel Clifton have sold more millions of pies to the Rockhampton community over the years and hope someone else will love it as much as they did.

Bernie and Carmel Clifton of Bernie's Pie Shoppe have retired after 38 years of business.

Bernie’s Pie Shoppe has been a staple of the Rockhampton community for the better part of the last four decades, from the food vans around town to the kids lining up before and after school to get a treat and the thousands of other loyal customers.

The shutter was pulled down for the final time on July 28 after 38 years in business, and 35 of those years at the Berserker Street premises.

Owners Carmel and Bernie Clifton have put the shop on the market in the hopes someone else will take it on and love it as much as they did.

The couple first opened a hot bread shop in Emu Park in 1975 and then moved to Rockhampton where they had a shop on Archer Street.

They purchased 349 Berserker Street, across from the pool, in 1987 and over the years grew the business, with 26 staff across the shop, rear factory and nine food vans.

“The harder you work, the luckier you get,” Bernie said.

Reflecting on the business’s success, Bernie said Carmel had been the backbone, working on the administration and sales’ side.

“She worked from seven in the morning until six at night and reared the boys … she’s my only critic,” he said.

Bernie's Pie Shoppe in 2010.

They raised three boys while running the business, putting two through apprenticeships in the factory.

It was long hours, with Bernie starting work at 1am every day.

“We made everything that went on those food vans, we made the bread roll that you put the salad on, everything from scratch from one o’clock in the morning,” Carmel said.

“It’s a very demanding lifestyle, if you want to go out at night, it’s off the cards, you’re very anti-social and to go home to bed at seven o’clock … it was very demanding to do it but we had a good life out of it.”

They also had staff that were like family.

“We were really lucky, we grew old with our staff, they’ve all retired,” Bernie said.

“That was the hardest thing, ladies who had worked for us for 20 years and we couldn’t replace them.”

When asked how many pies he had made over the years, Bernie confidently said millions with the most popular flavour being plain, followed by cheese and bacon.

In true baker’s terminology, everything is calculated in dozens.

The factory and cooking area at the rear of the premises.

“In our heyday we were doing over a 100 dozen a day, which is 1200 pies, on a Friday we would do 130-140 dozen,” he said.

“Lamingtons by the thousands, 100 dozen a day.”

They were also well known for their Mexican roll, a hot dog sausage with a sweet chilli mixture in pastry and pizza pies.

They had a lot of commercial customers too from Rockhampton Grammar School to Meals on Wheels and the Singapore Army.

School time was always a big rush, with the North Rockhampton High School just down the road, the buses would pull up and they would have swarms of students from 8am to 9am.

Then in the afternoon they would put the leftovers from the pie van in the counter for $2 or so.

“Well, at three o’clock in the afternoon the kids would run to get in the queue to buy the food,” Carmel said.

One special customer was a local teacher who would come in every so often and put $50 on the counter and say give the school kids the leftovers free this afternoon.

“The customers who were upset the most were the school kids … we saw them go through year seven to year 12,” Carmel said.

Another noteworthy occasion was the chaos of Cyclone Marica in 2015.

Their son managed to wrangle a generator and customers lined out the door as the power was out everywhere.

“No one could cook or do anything, we sold absolutely everything that was edible out of this shop, sausages, hamburgers, hot dogs, we made pies,” Carmel said.

The decision to close after all the years of blood, sweat and tears did not come lightly.

Bernie has been unable to work for the past two years as he has been going through chemotherapy for cancer and running the business has been getting too much.

“The hardest decision was when we said we were pulling the shutter down, when we said we were doing it we couldn’t wait to get there,” Carmel said.

So far, Bernie is loving his new-found freedom and a later bedtime … he now stays up until 8.30pm.

He has discovered all of the night time television shows he has missed out on over the years.

“I’m catching up on my TV; I like the cooking shows,” he said.

“He gets up for breakfast and says I am just going to go watch a bit of TV, it drives me mad,” Carmel joked.

“He’s never watched telly in his life, he’d watch the seven o’clock news and as soon as the weather came on he went to bed.”

The former Bernie's Pie Shoppe is now for sale or lease.

The property is now for sale or lease through Jonathon Offord of Knight Frank Rockhampton.

The site has 650 sqm of covered space in total, and is fully operational with ovens and cold rooms, walk in, walk out bakery, including a very handy generator.

The five-bedroom home next-door can also be included in the sale.

Originally published as Bernie’s Pie Shoppe Rockhampton for sale after 38 years of business