Beverly Donathen continues the legacy her mother Lucy Majors started 50 years ago at Lucy’s Cake Shop. Donathen is supported by her husband and a staff of 20 employees, some of whom have worked at Lucy’s for 40 years.We know you value our education reporting. We need your help in raising $20,000 to hire a reporter dedicated to covering higher education in San Antonio.There was no special occasion calling for cake.
Even Navarro can’t count the number she’s ordered over the years. “Oh mamita!” she exclaimed at the thought. “I just felt like she was just exhausted,” Donathen said. “That way when she came home, all she had to do is put it together and she didn’t have to start from the beginning.”Business grew and Majors needed more space so she built the small cake shop at 2030 SW Loop 410, near Marbach Road.
Donathen kept on working at the shop through high school, putting in long hours on Friday nights after football games and returning on Saturdays. The bakery is staffed with many longtimers, some who have worked there for 30 to 40 years. Lucas Ramirez got a job at Lucy’s at the urging of a teacher during his freshman year of high school.
Tubs of icing in every color and decorator bags and tips are organized across the kitchen and, on wire shelves, finished cakes are stacked high, from a pink swirly two-layer and a blue Cookie Monster to a sheet cake with red roses and a chocolate cake with chocolate icing. Increasing competition in the cake-baking industry has tested Lucy’s. In years past, the biggest players were only Lucy’s, Nadler’s, Serma’s and H-E-B, Donathen said. “But now when all the cake shows started to come on … there’s almost like a bakery on every corner.”