Jan. 15 Is National Bagel Day but NYC Shops Are Largely Ignoring It
NYC considers itself the heart of bagel-making. But National Bagel Day, set for Jan. 15, is generating little enthusiasm here, aside from a few national outlets.
| 12 Jan 2026 | 02:30
At one of the few Manhattan bagel emporiums planning to honor National Bagel Day on Jan. 15, H&H will give Rewards program members a free bagel-and-cream-cheese combination. (
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Asked which type of bagel they would want to be stranded on a desert island with, one-third of respondents to a recent survey picked the everything bagel. (
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While bagel shops across the US and abroad are celebrating National Bagel Day on Jan. 15, the Manhattan temples of hole-y-ness, for the most part, give it a “meh.” Manhattan devotees of the schmear may be bound for disappointment.
With a couple of exceptions, this yearly bake-fest tradition, established in 2003 by the Bagel Bakery Association, has bypassed our island.
From Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where bagels cost a US dollar or so—maybe it’s really International Bagel Day—to Englewood, NJ, promotions abound, sometimes just for members of their e-mail programs, and others for everybody.
Last week, Austin, Texas-based Einstein Bros Bagels released its first ever “State of the Bagel” report. In a survey of 1,000 US adults, 52 percent now say they’ll eat bagels anytime of the day, and 55 percent prefer bagels to donuts. A similar percentage admits they lick the cream cheese off the knife when spreading the schmear at home. And if stranded on the proverbial desert island, one-third admitted fealty to the everything bagel as their bagel of choice to accompany them.
On National Bagel Day, Einstein Bros will provide an opportunity for a “new schmear’s resolution” at their outlets (none in Manhattan; closest one open to the general public is in Yardley, Pa.). With the mention of the secret words (um, “National Bagel Day”), you can get a bagel with your favorite cream cheese.
Closer to home, on Jan. 15, the H&H bagel chain, which has branches uptown and downtown and which has made cameo appearances in “Sex and the City” and “Seinfeld,” is offering their Manhattan rewards members a bagel/schmear combo free with a membership in the program. H&H has been a New York City fixture since the 1970s.
Panera, a coast to coast chain with Manhattan outlets, has a membership free bagel promotion if you buy one of their new sandwiches.
Ess-a-bagel, on 19th St. and First Ave. in the Stuyvesant Town complex will provide a coffee for only 50 cents with a bagel purchase that day.
Pop-Up Bagels is marking January 15 with the launch of a new limited-edition flavor, Honey Chipotle Cream and will also be serving Garlic Rosemary Butter on that day but you’re paying full price for the chance to sample the new flavor.
Straus News Manhattan polled over a dozen other neighborhood stores on January 9 to see how they would celebrate NBD.
A call to Matt, the manager of Tompkins Square Bagel on E. 68th Street manager, said nothing was planned for the four stores in that group.
Phone calls to local stores, including David’s Bagels at First Ave and E. 16th St, indicated that National Bagel Day was either not something on their radar, or there was no confirmation about promotions we could obtain by press time.
The newly opened New Absolute Bagels had a week or free promotions to marks its return to the UWS, but manager Amy Kim said it did not plan any other promotions to mark Jan. 15.
In short, alas, it doesn’t look like Jan. 15 will be different from any other day for most Manhattanites knoshing at their favorite neighborhood bagel store.
While the proverbial “schmear” of cream cheese has Yiddish roots, in the words of Einstein Bros Bagels Chief Marketing Officer Jessica Serrano assessing their survey, “These insights prove that bagels have become more than just food. They are a cultural phenomenon.”