Paper Bag Sandwich Co. fights to bring back lunch

For Hunter Breshears, lunch is not just another meal to rush through between meetings. It is a ritual he thinks people have lost somewhere along the way.

In an effort to fight for the midday meal, the young entrepreneur is preparing to open his latest concept at The Frederick in Phoenix this June.

Paper Bag Sandwich Co. will offer a menu of scratch-made sandwiches built on house-baked bread, filled with local ingredients and wrapped up in nostalgic brown paper bag packaging. 

Beneath the sandwiches and lemonade is a larger goal: convincing people to slow down long enough to actually enjoy their lunch.

“We want people to take their lunch break back,” Breshears says. “Our entire business model is going all in on lunch.”

The name Paper Bag Sandwich Co. came from Breshears’ childhood memories.

“For most people like myself, they grew up eating lunch out of a brown paper bag that their mom sent them to school with,” he says.

That sentimental approach extends throughout the concept. Customers’ names will be handwritten on bags, and Breshears says he and his team plan to make an effort to remember the names of repeat customers.

Originally from Denver, Breshears moved to Phoenix at 19 to attend GCU, where he studied entrepreneurship. He put his coursework to the test and built Chewk’s Cookies from his dorm room. What began as baking a few hundred cookies each week for students quickly evolved into a business, and eventually into a broader obsession with restaurant concepts with a tight focus.

“I’ve always been fascinated with Chick-fil-A, In-N-Out, Cane’s, and those restaurant concepts that just do one thing and do it really, really well and don’t try to do anything else,” he says.

Launching another food concept came with both excitement and risk, Bresheaars says, especially as he and his wife Emily weighed the reality of signing a lease for a business that did not yet fully exist. 

While he describes himself as “a dreamer,” he says his wife has been supportive throughout the process. Together, they decided to take the leap on the opportunity at The Frederick, where Chewk’s is also located, and build the concept from the ground up. 

Despite the ambitious vision, Breshears says the business has been built on a lean budget. He estimates the startup costs at roughly $20,000, aided in part by inheriting a previously built-out space. The unit was formerly occupied by The Charcuterie Creative.

Paper Bag Sandwich Co. will launch with a minimal menu of six signature sandwiches, including Italian-inspired options, turkey, ham and a vegetarian caprese. The owners are also experimenting with gluten-free bread and plan to serve an “Uncrustable-style” kids menu for busy parents visiting the shopping center.

Central to the concept is the bread itself. After being inspired by a sandwich he ate in Florence, Italy, Breshears set out to recreate that experience in Phoenix using schiacciata, a Tuscan flatbread baked in-house daily. To help perfect the product, he partnered with baker Ryne Spracale of Moxie Coffee Co. to “bring in the best minds to help create these sandwiches,” Breshears says.

The menu will also reflect the brand’s “better-for-you” mindset, with minimally processed ingredients, Southwest-sourced produce and drinks ranging from prebiotic sodas to fresh-shaken lemonade. The concept will not serve alcohol.

“People care more than ever about what’s going inside of their bodies,” Breshears says. “I would never have a good conscience serving something that was cutting corners.”

Still, Breshears says the real goal goes beyond nutrition or efficiency. He wants Paper Bag Sandwich Co. to become a neighborhood lunch spot where people step away from their desks, sit outside and reconnect with others for a moment in the middle of the day.

“I used to work in corporate,” he says. “I always sat at the desk and just ate through my lunch instead of intentionally taking time to leave the office with somebody and go and pick something up and be a human and not a robot.”

While the interior footprint is small, the shop will include counter seating and access to outdoor seating at The Frederick.

Paper Bag Sandwich Co.’s owners are currently targeting a June 5 opening. Initial operating hours will be 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., with hopes of expanding to breakfast in the near future.

For Breshears, success will not just be measured in sandwiches sold, he says, but in whether people walk away feeling cared for.

“If we can deliver on the hospitality, an excellent sandwich, and a memorable moment for people, that’s really what we’re going for,” he says.

Paper Bag Sandwich Co.

Opening on June 5: 1215 E. Missouri Ave., #1