George Habib never thought it would end with him.
“It’s been in the family forever,” Habib said. “I’ll miss my customers and going there every day. It was kind of like my second home in a way.”
But it’s time, the third-generation owner said as he bid adieu to French Bakery & Delicatessen in the Riverview section of Norfolk.
The business at 4108 Granby St. had shuttered on July 1 with a note posted on the door: “Temporarily closed. Be Back Soon.” But the bakery-deli was not to open again. On Tuesday, the entire contents — from equipment to decor and a plethora of antiques — of the more than century-old business went up for auction online.
The menu sign advertising their signature pastrami sandwiches leans up against a window inside French Bakery & Delicatessen in the Riverview neighborhood of Norfolk on the day their entire inventory was auctioned off, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026. (Kendall Warner/The Virginian-Pilot)
The French Bakery & Delicatessen, known for its piled-high pastrami sandwiches, rum cakes, made-from-scratch pies — with proprietary recipes that date back to the old country — and its friendly down-to-earth atmosphere, is a slice of history that many say they will miss.
The owner’s grandfather, Elias Habib, started the family-owned and -operated business in 1912 — 114 years ago. He founded the bakery after purchasing a downtown location from a French baker.
The late patriarch had escaped the Ottoman Empire in Lebanon and immigrated to Norfolk where his brother-in-law lived — eager to provide a livelihood for his family and pursue the American Dream. During the Great Depression, Habib fed the city’s hungry with free cups of soup and freshly baked loaves of bread.
At one point, the business had grown to four locations in Hampton Roads — one in Virginia Beach, another in Portsmouth and two in Norfolk. The Riverview location, which opened in the early 1940s, survived the longest.
Orange doughnuts, eclairs, pork sandwiches, European buttercream cakes — all could be found at the French Bakery & Delicatessen. Generations of families recalled Habib’s grandfather baking wedding cakes for their grandparents, he said.
“We have the best fruitcake in the country,” Habib said. “No one can match our stuff and they never did.”
Steve Hall lives in Virginia Beach and works in Norfolk about 10 minutes from the bakery. He has been a customer since the late 1970s and would bring family, co-workers and business associates there, one of his favorite spots, throughout the years. It offered a unique, special experience filled with sandwiches and conversations.
“I’ve eaten at Katz’s Deli in New York and I think George’s pastrami sandwich was the best I’ve ever had,” Hall said.
Paul Decker Sr. recalled stopping by the bakery in his younger years with his close friend Pierre Habib — George’s younger brother — before they drove the 16 hours back to college together in Miami. He said their mother would make them three sandwiches each — two roast pork and a pastrami.
“There’s no other sandwich like it anywhere on earth, believe it or not,” Decker said. “I’ve traveled the world and I’ve never had a sandwich that had those characteristics.”
In its heyday, George Habib recalled all of his family members working together in the business. But, as time went by, those he loved were lost. Elias Habib died in 1959. George Habib Sr. died suddenly in 1977 from a heart attack. That’s when Habib’s mother, Haifa Moujais Habib, took over the operations. As she aged, Habib and his sister, Selma, became her caregiver while he and his brother, Eli, ran the bakery.
The two carried on the family legacy with the same hardworking pride as their forefathers. They both had started working there when they were just 10 years old. Eli had a knack for baking; George was more business savvy. In 2017, Eli suffered a massive heart attack in the bakery. George Habib found him and tried to resuscitate him, but he died.
Their mother died during the pandemic in 2021, he said. And Habib’s sister, Sylvia, died last June from cancer.
“That just knocked the wind out of me,” he said, noting he closed the doors to the business in July unsure of what he wanted to do next. He spent three months in Lebanon, his family’s native land.
He’s thankful that his uncle, Monier Moujais, stepped in to help him out the last 10 years.
“Until the last few years, I was putting in 19 hours a day, seven days a week,” Habib said.
After a couple of bouts with pneumonia and then surgery, Habib, now 72, said it’s not worth it to keep the business running any longer.
Three customers-turned-friends would come in every day, sit down and “discuss the world” for hours with him, he said. But they died within a year of one another.
“It breaks my heart to have to do this,” Habib said. “But how many more years am I going to live?”
As for what’s next for the building, with its brick gas oven — one of the oldest in the state — built into the structure, Habib said he heard that the management company may have someone else interested in opening a bakery.
Sandra J. Pennecke, 757-652-5836, sandra.pennecke@pilotonline.com
George Habib, third-generation owner of French Bakery & Delicatessen in the Riverview neighborhood of Norfolk, locks up his family business for the last time on the day their entire inventory was auctioned off, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026.(Kendall Warner/The Virginian-Pilot)
