Sad to see an inferior outfit buyout Paradise Bakery. Food isn't really different but the service model of Panera is lousy relative to Paradise. I have never gotten my food exactly the way I ordered it because the interaction between customers and food preparers is gone. Also, the fact Panera has made zero effort to integrate the Paradise reward points does not help my loyalty. I'll still drop in for a cookie, but plan to find a new place for salads.
***update
I retract my statement regarding food being essentially the same. Paradise had an outstanding club sandwich on a croissant roll that Panera has not continued. Also, the cookies are not as good. They're more like grocery store cookies than Paradise's. This seems odd to me as I was informed that Panera uses the same dough as the remaining Paradise stores... The texture is markedly different though.