Panera Bread in the Chicago Loop in 2006. Panera Bread is an American chain store of bakery-café fast casual restaurants with over 2,000 locations, panera broccoli cheddar soup of which are in the United States and Canada. The company operates as Saint Louis Bread Company in the Greater St.

Louis area, where it has over 100 locations. Offerings include bakery items, pasta, salads, sandwiches, soups, and specialty drinks. As of 2020, the menu also includes flatbread pizzas. The company, which until 2021 also owned Au Bon Pain, is owned by JAB Holding Company which is, in turn, owned by the Reimann family of Germany. These, along with Panera’s artisan breads, are typically baked before dawn by an on-staff baker. During its final 20 years as a public company, from 1997 to 2017, it was the best performing restaurant stock, delivering an 86-fold return to shareholders.

Panera was once the largest provider of free Wi-Fi hotspots in the United States. Many locations restrict the duration of free Wi-Fi to 30 or 60 minutes during peak hours. Ken and Linda Rosenthal founded The St. Louis Bread Company in 1987 with the first location in Kirkwood, Missouri. In 1987, Au Bon Pain changed the company name to Panera, from a word that has roots in the Latin word for “breadbasket” and is identical to the word for “breadbasket” in Spanish and Catalan.

It kept its original name for locations in Missouri. In May 1999, Au Bon Pain Co. 78 million, in order to focus on the Panera Bread chain. In 2000, Panera Bread moved its headquarters to Richmond Heights, Missouri. A class action lawsuit was filed against the company in February 2008, alleging it failed to disclose material adverse facts about the company’s financial well-being, business relationships, and prospects. 75 million to shareholders while admitting no wrongdoing, settling the lawsuit.

In November 2010, Panera Bread relocated its headquarters to Sunset Hills while vacating its Richmond Heights headquarters and Brentwood, Missouri offices. The company leased additional space for its headquarters in 2013. In May 2014, Panera unveiled “Panera 2. 0”, a series of integrated technologies including new capabilities for digital ordering, payment, operations, and ultimately, consumption. Panera unveiled its official Food Policy in June 2014, which detailed commitments to clean ingredients, transparency, and a positive impact on the food system.