“The Brothers” were born into the baking business in Zaire Africa, the town of Lumbumbashi.  After nationalization in 1974, they emigrated from Zaire to Chicago where they began to play with dough in their family bakery.  Living in sleeping bags their first several months at the bakery the family founded, they learned the definition of hard work.  The Brothers watched their parents bake croissants all night, deliver to stores, then drop Yianny off at school.

In 1997 Yianny joined Frank Kuchuris at Gold Standard Baking, building sales in foodservice and the in-store bakery.  In 2000 George joined him on the sales team.

2002 presented a golden opportunity … to buy Gold Standard Baking.  The Brothers are forever grateful to Frank for selling the company and mentoring them thru the years.  This was a bakery producing 300,000 croissants per week that quickly started to grow.  In 2004, The Caparos’ made their first investment in a high-speed laminator to become a low cost producer of croissants.  They pioneered production techniques that enabled thaw n serve croissants to be of convenience to customers on a macro level.  Over the next several years they invested in multiple production lines to meet the demand on a national level.  This could not have been done without the partnership and engineering expertise from Eric Riggle & Rademaker as well as the Dunbar family.

In 2008, Yianny and George’s life changed forever as they partnered with Arbor Investments for the next seven years.  Greg Purcell and Joe Campolo led them to new heights and together built the largest thaw n serve croissant manufacturer in North America.  The Caparos’ are forever grateful to Greg Purcell and Joe Campolo.

In 2019, The Brothers co-invested with Arbor and Cordia Harrington to form what is known as Crown Bakeries.  Today we are 1400 people strong, and our mission is:

–        Create opportunities
–        Make a difference, and
–        Impact lives

Through strong work ethic, love and support from their family, and tremendous co-workers led by Scott Shelley, the Caparos brothers are living the dream.