Judges Bakery in Hastings

Disappointed with the Service and Communication at Judges Bakery, Hastings I recently had a deeply disappointing experience with Judges Bakery in Hastings. I purchased a cake for a friend, only to later discover it was out of date. What should have been a straightforward process to resolve this turned into a frustrating ordeal. After calling and emailing the bakery multiple times, I was passed around between various staff members, each offering no real resolution. Despite explaining clearly that I am not local and would need a bank transfer for the refund, they initially insisted on giving me cash in person. I had to persistently follow up before anyone even acknowledged this. Instead of addressing the problem immediately, the bakery seemed more concerned with defending their actions rather than understanding the impact this had on me as a customer. Worse still, they used accusatory language, calling me “malicious” for simply expecting a refund for an out-of-date product they sold. This level of customer service is unacceptable. Only after several emails and phone calls did they finally agree to process the refund via bank transfer, but to date, I still haven’t received it. I would advise anyone thinking of shopping here to be cautious. If you find yourself in a similar situation, you may end up spending more time chasing a basic refund than actually enjoying your purchase. I have reported them to my credit card company and will be reporting them to trading standards and the food standards agency.

Amazing red onion sausage rolls and donuts - exceptionally value for money as well! If you visit Hastings, this place is a must go!!!!

Wir hatten hier zwei Süßwaren gekauft und diese waren sehr lecker. Der mit Rosinen gefüllte Eccle Cake, als auch ein Marzipangebäck - schmecken selbstgemacht, frisch und lecker! (Was Brot etc. und herzhaftes angeht, können wir nichts beisteuern)

Best bakers in the south east! Worth the queue.

Excellent little bakery located on the main road running through the Old Town. Great selection of pastries and cakes on offer. Served by a welcoming and friendly member of staff. Will be returning in the future.

Fantasising about a pain au raisin. Duly bought one from here. So disappointed by it! Dry, stretchy, very little custard and poor raisin ratio to pastry. Tbh the ones in Lidl are much better. Please take note!

Quite simply the most delicious coffee I’ve ever had! I have been coming down almost every summer since 2019 and the very first thing I do is go to Judges for a coffee! Their pastries are divine too!

Popped into this morning for loaves as forgot yesterday, Kate was friendly and smiling and made me feel really welcome, she's a real credit to you all

Found a super affordable bakery by accident! The freshly made bread is delicious! The staff are also very friendly 😆 The whole street is filled with the smell of bread, and there are other dry goods you can buy in the store! ! Highly recommended!

Had an amazing quiche and toast sandwich a little pricey but was worth it

Yet to find anything they sell that isn’t delicious. Sausage rolls with onion is particularly good, as are the cheesy topped rolls.

Best coffee and pain aux raisin in town. Always lovely service from the team and the shop is always full of lovely looking things 🤩

Bought carrot cake and chocolate brownie. Tasted DIVINE!!! humble prices. Please pay them a visit and I am so sure that you’ll regret not having gone there earlier.

The best Bread,Pastries and Cakes in Hastings! The staff are lovely and the coffee is great too…

Top notch coffee, ordered a small coffee with extra shot and was advised the third shot wasn't really needed. Trusted the worker and yeh- full bodied I think works as a description. Not a watery coffee, great taste and strong. Also had a pork pie, not the best but ok, tried an Eccles cake for the first time, really nice but perhaps a tad too big, would have been ideal shared or maybe two thirds or even half the size. Would for sure return for the coffee and to try their other tasty looking treats. Kudos to the honest baker, a young fella, bit portly, curly hair I think- could have sold me an insanely strong coffee, him and everyone there had excellent customer service, thank you.

The best bakery for miles around, fresh cakes. Fresh sandwiches, fresh bread. Nice Fresh coffee. Friendly staff, But very overpriced. 😢

What a lovely little place that Siobhan is a treasure and I had such a lovely time and the food was the best I've had in a while

rude staff- made to feel unwelcome! cold coffee will not be returning, a simple hello and good bye wouldn’t go a miss, queuing order not clear!

rude and unhelpful. nothing else to day

I visited the bakery in December to buy some bread. I am new to the area and had no idea what the shop offers. I ordered a sourdough, paid and asked for it to be sliced. Before the sales assistant went off to slice it I asked him is there anywhere close by that I can buy some ham and salad. He replied there is nowhere in the old town and my nearest supermarket would be Morrisons. When he went to the back to slice the bread I decided to take a look around the store to check what else you sold. I was surprised to then find that you had a large selection of cold meats and salad. I took them to the till for purchase to the same assistant and asked him why he didn’t tell me that you had the items that I had enquired about. His reply; it’s quite expensive here and I don’t like to push products! A. What kind of people do you have working in your store? Someone that refused to let me know that you do indeed sell the food I was looking for. B. How can a shop assistant assume what my budget is for food and what I consider to be expensive or not!!!! No apology, no thank you and goodbye. Outrageous behaviour and what a shame this is what happened on my first visit! What is this discrimination or an assistant telling me where I should shop?? Completely unacceptable I have contacted judges baker via emails 3 times regarding this matter and they have so far not replied. So as they clearly do not care, I’ve decided to leave a public review

Stop for cake and pork pie for lunch. It's was lovely, fresh and tasty

Simply the best bakery in town. The bread selection is outstanding.

Best Squirrel pies I’ve ever tasted !!!

This used to be a wonderful organic bakery....but it's not anymore. I thought I'd treat myself and buy some hand made mince pies for Xmas.... what a mistake!! They were the worst mince pies I have ever tasted. They looked great. But the filling was bland and absolutely tasteless. It was extremely disappointing. I had 4 friends over for mince pies & port on xmas eve. Everyone took one bite and the rest of each of the 4 pies we tasted, along with the ones I bought as a gift, all ended up in the bin, I'll never buy anything else in there again its shocking to say, but tescos mass produced super cheap mince pies are 100 times more tasty.

A Hastings classic. Great bread, pastries and sandwiches all year round and the best Christmas mince pies in the known universe. Go there and buy stuff now!

Love the bakery. Bit pricey and ashame dogs can't go in as I'd have loved grabbing a coffee each dog walking morning and some bread on the way home

We got a couple of pastries from here a cherry one and a lemon one. The cherry one was lovely. They were really fresh and large. Great value for money. They had a good range of things and also had a deli shop.

Slightly pricey but excellent produce. I bought a fantastic Cherry Frangipane Tart and a spinach and tomato quiche. Great pastry, plenty of fillings. Staff were also very friendly and helpful.

I bought two brownies on a Monday lunch time to take back to my family. They were stale and therefore really horrible. Disappointed. There was no bread available at 2pm at all. It was expensive and really needs to up its game.

Amazing bread, quiche and pastries (I'm local!)

Lovely clean coffee shop we love it great coffee amazing food and the staff extremely helpful . We love Allison always friendly and makes time to talk to us . We go there at least once a week .

Pork Pie - 10/10 Scotch egg - 10/10 (arguably the best one I’ve ever had) Chocolate twist - 10/10 No wonder this place has been open so long, unreal food. Will be back for more!

Lovely coffee & pastry shop. Locally owned & fresh bread made on site. Will do in a pinch for some grocery items, like pasta, sauce, fruit, veg. Pleasant staff.

Excellent bakery in Hastings. Great vegan and vegetarian options. Excellent sour dough bread. Very popular with locals and there are often queues.

Characterful building and interiors but the customer service being indifferent seems to be a recurring theme. Queue building up while the staff is busy chatting away to the customer they are serving as if they're at a social. Asking the other staff member to take the order and payment instead seemed like an imposition on his time as he was busy doing absolutely nothing. I got the impression that asking for basic customer service is a favour of some kind out here. The bakery is good quality and tasty going by what we sampled - a custard doughnut, cinnamon bun and flapjack although a bit on the pricey side. The coffee was very ordinary so definitely wouldn't recommend it - scalding hot with a poor taste profile. All in all OK, can't see what the hype (if any) is all about.

Lovely selection of sandwiches and savoury pastries, and also one of the best flapjacks I have ever eaten! Was so good we came here a few times over our stay!

The doughnuts here are so good I think about them all week until we cna visit again at the weekend. Friednly staff, great sweet treats, what more can you ask from a bakery?

I would describe myself as a bit of a croissant aficionado and the ones that Judges make are the best that I have ever eaten (and I have eaten a lot over the years). They are the perfect size, they have a crispness that elevates them far beyond your standard flabby pastry while retaining that wonderful yeasty softness within. The balance of the soft butteriness against a hint of sweetness and saltiness completes what can only be described as a masterpiece. Whenever I’m in Hastings, I seek them out. Get there early!

Fantastic and tasty food, and what a great choice of it!

Maniac Judges Bakery van driver just nearly rammed me and my mum off the road! Swung onto our side of the road forcing my mum to emergency stop then instead of apologising proceeded to do a rude hand gesture to her? Driving through the town way over the speed limit too when there’s school kids about.

Such a great bakery with lovely treats of all sorts and sizes.. if you don't get there in good time they'll for sure have sold out of most things so best to get in early if you want croissants for breakfast!

We called in a few days ago to buy some lime and sea salt brownies, which my son had really liked on a previous visit. We couldn't see them on display, so asked and they told us "We've never sold those." Despite having bought them previously, and despite them being mentioned on the website!

Amazing bread, lovely vegan treats, and always friendly and helpful staff 😊 Really recommend their white sourdough loaf!!

Best sourdough bread best service.

Amazing doughnuts and the best double double coffee in Hastings. Very friendly and welcoming staff.

Pastry that'll make your mouth melt

They’re the only place that still bake almond macaroons in the area and the service is always friendly. Sandwiches are very reasonably priced with the large cheese roll filled generously with tuna. One of my favourite places to eat when I’m around! Some of the produce / branded items sit at the higher price points but the bakery is usually reasonable.

Simply the best. Everything is delicious, sweet and salty goods are all hi quality. We loved in particular the flapjacks and the cinnamon roll.

Attractive little bakery selling a range of quality home made and local produce. We had a vegan flapjack and Viennese swirl, both very good.

Great cakes pastries coffee bread Among others

Excellent hot cross buns and freshly made

Almond croissants are great (but not available every day!) Get there early!

They charged me 7 pound for a small piece of white bread. I'm still shocked... when I came back with the ticket and said 7 pound really?We really have to check our receipts when coming here now? She went listen my manger is not here so just calm down .I was calm just shocked they would try charge me 7 pounds for a piece of bread. Its not even organic what's inside gold??? Worst part is she didn't even know how to cashback this money on my bank account so she went I think it's OK. You think? Just learn some new skills as better communication and how to use a card machine decently for instance... the "just calm down" will never work if YOU made a mistake you apologise politely and offer a chocolate.

Your sausage rolls are crazy delicious!!!!!🤤

Delicious food. Lovely staff. There is a seating area indoors and that is useful to know. Highly recommended.

Rude staff, no smile, no manners, rushing me in and out. Answering my simple question with a frustrated tone. Spent a lot over the last year here since my friend lives down the road. I won’t be returning.

Everything was delicious we visited because my boyfriends surname is Judge and we were in the area. Wish we had bought more pastries to take home I'm pregnant and used that as an excuse to take a bite out of everyone's goodies and there wasn't one thing that wasn't tasty. The savoury goods are yummy and the desserts are to die for

The best Eccles cake I’ve ever eaten - and I’m a bit of a connoisseur in that particular area.

Looked in the window, what they had looked nice

Customer service is 0 . Unfriendly staff. Bought a quiche and it was super cold and the young lady said that they don’t warm the food . It is not a pleasant experience, I will not come back again .

Relatively friendly staff, and a good place to visit while in Hastings for pastries and bread.

I just bought a smoked mackerel quiche which had more half boiled potato in it than mackerel or filling. Really disappointing 😞

I have been getting the Judges sourdough for years now and nothing compares. The cinnamon buns & almond croissants on a weekend are also amazing. Best bakery in town.

Magnificent pork pies and friendly staff.

Polite staff and a good selection of goods.

Now that the service has gotten friendlier, can finally leave a 5 star review. Tuna cucumber cheesey roll, coronation chicken sarnie and vegan sausage roll with caramelised onion are all *chefs kiss* - keep up the friendly service! It makes a big difference.

Every time we visit Hastings, or indeed anywhere near Hastings, we always make a point of visiting the bakers - the ideal place to get all you could possibly need for a great picnic! lovely cakes. Sandwiches and savouries of the best quality. You haven't been there? Why ever not?

Concrete bread Bought a sourdough rye loaf from Judges that cost £4 and you could have demolished a side of a building with it

First very poor bakery, I've ever come across. Purchased two belgium buns. Tasted stale/old. Centre lemon curd filling tasted old. Could not finish the bun, as unpleasant in so many ways. I wished I'd gone to a supermarket. In the morning the half a bun faced me, instead of eating a bite. I threw it in the bin. A big zero from me. I'll never use again.

I honestly am addicted to the cinnamon buns with cream cheese. The tray bakes at the weekend are such a treat, I work in the area and often come down for a cheese and pickle cheesy roll or goats cheese/spinach sour dough sandwich. Haven’t had a bad thing to eat there. Sausage rolls are also very tasty. Coming from Brighton I found prices very reasonable in comparison.

freshly baked bread daily and its organic

Really yummy cakes, bakes and coffee. On a few visits service hasn't been the friendliest but it's worth going back for the food!

Some of the food is nice but very overpriced for the quality. Worst aspect of this bakery is the rude staff, which is very known in the local area. How this still has not been dealt with to this day is beyond me.

I popped in to buy some bread and treats for my grandsons on Sunday, the product was fine but the experience of shopping there was cold and uninviting. Such a shame, a smile costs nothing xx

Visited Judges bakery as were holidaying close by. Wow! Amazing Cherry Bakewell tart ( returned for some to bring home) and chocolate biscuit slice made with best quality chocolate 5⭐️

Yummy 😋and delicious cakes and muffins 😋 Everything good will go again. 👍👍👍

Great staff, and value for money for the tasty bread and lovely cakes that they make.

Good breads, wide choice of bakes, excellent range of quality products.

Really friendly staff, helpful and aware of their products and stock. Only downer was they didn't pack all my purchases, so got home and was missing things that were paid for! Difficult to check on site as it was busy! Great quality bakery though!

Lovely artisan bread, huge meringues a speciality

Stopped for a warm vegan roll (with red onion) - wow, amazing! Flaky pastry & delicious filling. So good & authentic I had to check I had been given a vegan one. Definitely be back.

A snobby expensive little place whose bread and cakes are very ordinary, but they lack any competition nearby. Much better is to be found in bakeries in central Hastings and in St Leonards.

Excellent as always. The bread goes fast, get there early for a full selection.

Always buy my vegan sausage rolls from them always very friendly girls serving best bakers in Hastings.

Amazing range of baked goods.....lovely pastries, and the Eccles cakes are just superb. If you walk down the alleyway to the right-hand side of the shop, you can smell the bread baking.....lovely!

Great bakery. Shame the cafe is shut at the moment, but you can still get takeaway

Good bakery and delicatessen selection. Would have score stars butthe queuing arrangements were a little confused.

Great selection of pastries, we had a pecan pie and a Viennese whirl and they were both delicious!

Lovely bakery... Amazing sausage rolls and yummy cakes.

We would highly recommend this bakery to anyone!

Quite possibly the most delicious sausage roll ever! Also yummy quiches and fabulous tiffin. Everything we needed for a picnic, delicious and fresh, and served by a friendly and polite young man. We are looking forward to coming back soon :)

Two loaves bread ordered were soggy inside very disappointing, great coffee though

Popped in as the shop was closing last just to get a couple of scones, which were gorgeous. Yes on the expensive side, but delish. Also bough a large meringue which had last night with strawberries and cream and it was truly excellent. Very glad we were passing.

There is a correlation between good pastry and happiness. First time here, had scones with cheese and spinach and it was quite delicious. I couldn't stopped myself imagining the fresh baked smoking hot version 🤤 I don't understand why all bakeries and patisseries only sell sweet pastries and bake cheesy salty tasty scones, meat pastries. It's a pity 🐢 I definitely visit here again 100% sure.

Lovely bakery with lots of other quality food products - cheese, hams, wine, beer, veg etc. And with very nice, polite young staff!

Amazing viennese sandwich and chelsea bun.

I quickly popped into Judges on my way to work this morning and bought a cheese and spinach scone for £1.60. Unfortunately the scone was not fresh and I was very disappointed.

Nice sausage rolls and sweet pastries. Great coffee too. Will be coming back!

Delicious cheese and onion pie, great customer service, very friendly, can’t wait to eat our doughnuts, they look delicious.

Superb bakery in Hastings. The almond tart and scone were so tasty.