Earlier this year, Roslyn residents and college students Ryan Gomez, Kion Noori and Harrison Berger were looking forward to summer internships and jobs they had lined up.
But once the COVID-19 pandemic hit, those plans were canceled, and the three graduates of Roslyn High School found themselves without anything to do over the summer.
Gomez, a rising senior at Duke University, Noori, a rising senior at Washington University in St. Louis, and Berger, a rising senior at the University of Michigan, were discussing the circumstances at a friend’s house, when an idea came up.
“We were in our friend’s backyard eating dinner, and talking about losing our internships,” Gomez said. “And one of his dad’s friends said, ‘if I were you and had my summer internship canceled, I would figure out how to be an entrepreneur. There are all these businesses that could use delivery.'”
The friends began brainstorming ideas of what to deliver.
“I was like, oh my goodness, bagels, that’s one everyone loves on Long Island and Roslyn too,” Gomez said. “So we started in on the possibility of us creating this business.”
Partnering with several unnamed bagel stores in the Roslyn area, Gomez, Noori and Berger set up Bagel Rush, an online ordering service for having bagels delivered over the weekend.
The process begins when customers place their orders over an online form at least a day ahead of time, with a choice of delivery on Friday, Saturday or Sunday.
“We collect the orders, count up the totals of bagels and spreads, and then give the order to the shop the night before,” Gomez said.
The three then pick up the bagels and spreads early in the morning, and pack the orders in Berger’s basement.
“We have labels and receipts printed, plus a route optimizer so that we can do the driving in the most efficient way,” Noori said.
Orders are then dropped off on doorsteps by 10 a.m., allowing the bagels to remain fresh.
Since starting last week, the friends say they have had “a lot of positive feedback.”
“On Sunday we had a lot of orders for Father’s Day, and we usually get a lot of orders from families,” Berger said.
To celebrate their first few weeks of operation, Bagel Rush will donate a percentage of the profits to All Hands and Hearts, a disaster relief organization that counts former Roslyn Board of Education member Adam Haber on its board of directors.
Berger said that the three are also taking time to handwrite and attach a short note for every order.
“Every time we have an order, we provide a handwritten note saying thank you, just for being one of our first customers,” Berger said.
Orders can be placed at https://www.bagelrush.com.
