The Future 50

Husband-wife team Craig and Dawn Saxton launched the Specialty’s brand in San Francisco in 1987 in a small retail space that lacked outside signage. Despite the nondescript building, the cafe proved successful. Additional California locations followed. Eventually, the chain expanded into the Illinois and Washington state markets. Specialty’s Cafe & Bakery offers two separate menus during breakfast, lunch and dinner hours: a cafe menu and a catering menu. The cafe breakfast menu begins with a handful of breakfast sandwiches. For lunch and dinner, the selection of sandwiches includes offerings such as roasted turkey on sesame-sourdough bread, tuna salad on whole-wheat bread, cobb on potato-poppy seed bread and hot roasted veggie on toasted herb bread.