Loblolly Bakery — Restaurant in Hattiesburg

Update: I have tried Loblolly again. It seems that things have improved since their opening. The quiche was great!

Concept: Loblolly is like a mix of Grin Coffee, the old Breadsmith store, and Panera. This is not the place to get delicate and light desserts. It is "heartier" sorts of baked goods.

🥖Food: I'd say the items I have ordered both times were average baked goods. Nothing stands out for good or bad.

🧍‍♀️Service: Staff are nice, but there seems to be a lack of organization. I got asked at the case what I wanted to order but told that I needed to order certain items at the register, which is fine but this becomes very redundant. Once at the register, you get asked what you ordered (what milk is in your drink, whats in your box, etc) because they shut the box and don't write orders down throughout the process. For there to be 8 staff members behind the counter and it is still slow and repetitive is a bit odd. I think having a system of writing an order ticket and passing it down might help a bit.

⏰️Availability: I will say that I came during opening week and waited to return before writing this review in order to see if improvements were made. By 10 AM, they really only have bagels and loaf bread left in the cases. The sweet items are about gone excluding the hard mini cookies on their table in the waiting area. The cake case was also empty. It just seems like the consistency of other items is not there. Other people in line also seemed put off by this. Some even stated they came by multiple times to try an item on their menu and it is...

If you go for nothing else, do yourself a favor and grab one of their hot sausage or bacon biscuits. I pretty much just go there for those lol, but I also like their chocolate croissants and humble pies. My husband loves their pecan pinwheel and cinnamon roll. It's a new bakery (open for less than a month), so give the staff a break as they try to figure out a system that works for them. I've already seen a lot of improvements!

My only criticism is the birthday cake we ordered for my daughter's 16th birthday party. We asked them to make a dairy free cake, and I guess they tried their best. It was beautifully decorated like we wanted, but the cake itself was inedible. I've eaten sand that was wetter, lol. If I had known a dairy free cake would be that dry, I would have ordered a regular cake for our guests and just made something for my lactose intolerant teen myself. We took the cake up there to show how dry it was, but the person we talked to didn't seem interested in trying it for herself. We hoped by doing that they would learn from their mistake and not make that kind of cake for anyone...EVER. For a $55 cake, you expect it to be edible.

Other than that, we do like this bakery a lot and hope they keep...

Very nice and clean. Ordered 2 king cakes one peaches and cream cheese and one blueberry. When I got home the peaches was mislabeled and both cakes were blueberry, disappointed as we are 2 hours away. Overall, best king cake you will find in Hattiesburg but not the best I have ever had being from Louisiana. Closely Compares to a Gambino’s king cake, wish I could have tried a different flavor as I purchased to give a better rating. The only thing I wasn’t crazy about was although the blueberries are real and not canned, they tasted like they were frozen then cooked and some were shriveled leaving a medium to hard berry with gritty texture. If that’s your thing, you’ll love this cake! Cream cheese is nice and thick (like Gambinos) and bread was good (although both cakes were baked with different thicknesses) the icing was delicious not too sweet and cake was cooked before icing or sugar so it was beautifully presented with...