Commercial Baking February | Q1 2022 by AvantFoodMedia

ISSUE Q1 FEB 2022

CLEAN LABEL

CATEGORY TRENDS

LAST CRUMB’S MAT T JUNG

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Companion Baking THIS ST. LOUIS BAKERY HAS A CULTURE OF ‘YES’

MARCH 2021 ISSUE 1

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OUR COMMUNITY

QuickTakes

American Society of Baking

COMMERCIAL BAKING Paul Lattan

| digital edition

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Jordan Winter Creative Director jordan@avantfoodmedia.com

Liz Goodwin

Commercial Baking is published by Avant Food Media, 1703 Wyandotte Street #300, Kansas City, MO 64108. Commercial Baking considers its sources reliable and verifies as much data as possible, although reporting inaccuracies can occur. Consequently, readers using this information do so at their own risk. Commercial Baking is distributed with the understanding that the publisher is not liable for errors and omissions. Although persons and companies mentioned herein are believed to be reputable, neither Avant Food Media nor any of its employees accept any responsibility whatsoever for their activities. Commercial Baking magazine is printed in the USA and all rights are reserved. No part of this magazine may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the publisher. All contributed content and advertiser supplied information will be treated as unconditionally assigned for publication, copyright purposes and use in any publication or digital product and are subject to Commercial Baking’s right to edit.

Olivia Huels

Commercial Baking magazine is published quarterly, along with two annual issues, in print and digital formats. Circulation is tightly controlled, and the print issues are sent free of charge only to hand-verified industry decision makers and influencers. To apply for a free subscription, please visit www.commercialbaking.com/subscription.

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IN THIS ISSUE

Features

Companion Baking: Bread Bakers, Storytellers With a culture of ‘Yes,’ Companion Baking lives for its customers’ narratives.

PLUS: Look for QR codes that contain exclusive digital content throughout the issue.

Cover: Companion Baking founder Josh Allen (left), along with Josh Galliano, innovation leader and QA manager, are helping their customers tell stories on a plate. Read more on page 20. Photography by Liz Goodwin

Matt Jung: Life by the Drop

Critical Issues: Supply Chain

Product Development: Clean Label

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IN THIS ISSUE

Departments

TRENDS Category Outlook: Artisan Bread

Category Outlook: Donuts

International Market: Poland | NOWEL Bakery

I N N OVAT I O N S

Category Insight: Artisan Bread

Category Insight: Donuts

Supplier Solutions

Commercial Baking Channel

105

Ad Index

108

QUICK READS

Editor’s Note

Seen and Heard

Business Intel

The Last Word

110

COMMERCIAL BAKING

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SOFT BREAD & BUNS

ARTISAN BREAD & ROLLS

PIZZA & FLATBREADS

CAKES & PIES

PASTRIES & CROISSANTS

SCAN TO LEARN MORE

A N OTE FR O M TH E ED ITO R

Once More, from the Top Happy Anniversary! It’s been a year since this relationship began, and I can’t thank you enough for the part you’ve played in Commercial Baking’s successful launch. It’s an interesting thing to be a startup in already familiar territory. We couldn’t have gotten this thing off the ground without the strong industry relationships our team has cultivated throughout our careers. That said, much of our momentum has also come from the new connections we have made, many of whom are fellow startups or innovators with an affinity for fledgling brands. The same goes for our growing team of young talent — Jordan Winter, creative director; Liz Goodwin, managing editor; and Olivia Huels, multimedia specialist — who have not only doubled our staff size but also brought vibrance to this storied industry. Great things can happen with a fresh coat of paint. You’ll see that reflected on the pages of this issue, which focuses on emergence. Learn what happens when you have a culture of “yes,” or when you jump in with a concept that, at first glance, might seem ridiculous. And take a lesson from the Last Word on what happens when you drop the qualifier from “work friends.”

JOANIE SPENCER Editor-in-Chief | joanie@avantfoodmedia.com

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Commercial Baking spent its first year bringing you fresh insights on trends and innovations, and we’re not slowing down. It’s going to be an exciting 2022, so get ready to see the industry in a whole new light.

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Seen eard H

AND

“Point-of-sale data collected at the purchase, that’s not the moment of truth. A person makes the decision before they make the purchase or before they even click ‘add to cart.’” Robert Berg | Iridescent Data during data analytics webinar for the Emerge Network

“With years of experience across business journalism, venture capital and consumer products, I always try to tell emerging brands that media and marketers want more than just a sample box; we want to know why the company has a differentiated story to tell.” Douglas Yu | senior contributor | Forbes

“We have the cafes, and we work with restaurants, distributors and directly with some grocers. There are just so many layers, so we created an overall brand strategy that’s simply about making fresh bread.” Donna Wolfersberger | marketing director | Companion Baking on the challenges of branding through different channels

COMMERCIAL BAKING

SEEN AND HEARD

“At the intersections is where innovation occurs. Science for the sake of science is cool, but it has to offer a benefit. So, understanding science and how we can deploy it in business and in the ‘real world’ is key, especially for young talent.”” Jennifer Lindsey | VP, global marketing | Corbion speaking on industry-informed curriculum panel at NCSSS

WHEN PROOFING FLOOR SPACE IS TIGHT...

“The young lady came up to my truck, with Chuck Paterakis on the phone, and I was more than obliged to open [the truck] up. I handed out the bread, and what amazed me is that they waited for everybody else. Casey [Holihan Noe] and John [Noe] were actually the last ones to take their bread.” Ron Hill | driver | Schmidt Baking Co. on sharing bread with stranded motorists during I-95 winter shutdown

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BREAD BAKERS, STORYTELLERS With a culture of ‘Yes,’ Companion Baking lives for its customers’ narratives. BY J OAN I E S PEN C ER

Co m pa ni on Ba kin g se rv es fo od se rv fro m th e Ro ic e an d re ta ck ie s to th e il cu st om er s Ap pa la ch ia ns .

Photo by Liz Goodwin | Commercial Baking

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

F E AT U R E D B A K E R Y: C O M PA N I O N B A K I N G

At an intersection where improv meets architecture is a place for baking — and breaking — bread. That place is St. Louis-based Companion Baking, where the bakery is regaling consumers through the bread it produces. A tale may be told in the bakery’s adjacent café, where guests can watch the process through windows that separate the restaurant from the operation floor. But once the bread is made, it’s someone else’s story to tell, much like when an architect creates a structure to bring another’s vision — and use — to life. The Latin root of the word “compagnia” is cum pane, which means “with bread.” It’s the reason behind the name Companion Baking, chosen by founder Josh Allen. It’s also at the heart of everything the bakery does, be it with bakers, customers, customers’ customers or the guests who visit the Companion Baking cafes, one adjacent to the bakery and the other in nearby Ladue, MO. “We want people to break bread together,” Allen said. “And we want to be part of that conversation.”

Planning to come home and take over the family business after pursuing a liberal arts degree at Stanford, Allen changed course when he discovered the art of bread baking during his time in Northern California. Instead of stepping into distribution, he rented 1,000 square feet from his father’s warehouse and started baking bread, all the while remembering his lessons on relationships … and one important exercise from an improv class at Stanford: Always say yes.

“We’ve focused on developing our values around the community, our customers and our employees. Josh’s father took that philosophy with his business, and Josh has taken the same mindset.” Donna Wolfersberger | marketing director | Companion Baking

A St. Louis-area native, Allen grew up in foodservice distribution; his family founded and operated Allen Foods until its acquisition by US Foods in 2002, the company’s 101st year. He learned a few lessons growing up in food distribution’s transactional environment, and the first was that relationships are everything. “One important lesson I learned growing up was that orders are made based on relationship or on price,” Allen recalled. “And if a customer has to choose, they’ll pick relationship every time.”

“My family’s business formed my approach to customer service, and the bakery’s business has grown because we always say yes,” Allen said. “Saying yes is the first rule of improv, but it’s also important in a service-related industry. It’s the right thing to do in solidifying a relationship.” Companion Baking’s nimbleness — and ability to say yes — is how it provides fresh and frozen bread and sweet goods to foodservice and retail outlets in the 15- to 150-location range. A regional deli looking for a specific type of sub roll for a dozen or so locations is a space where Companion Baking can really flex its creative muscle. The sweet spot where Companion Baking likes to play is also where many emerging foodservice concepts live. In a town like St. Louis, with its long-standing independent restaurant community, this bakery fits right in. But that’s not to say Companion only serves its hometown. After moving into frozen distribution about 10 years ago, today more than half the bakery’s reach spans from the Rockies to the Appalachians, as far north as Minnesota, Michigan and Ohio, and down into Oklahoma and Kentucky. Allen and Companion Baking’s bread development team recognize customers’

COMMERCIAL BAKING

C O M PA N I O N B A K I N G

Photo by Liz Goodwin |Commercial Baking

need to create points of differentiation on their menu and on their plates, and the innovation happening at this bakery is catching attention from customers ranging from regional grocers to James Beard Award-winning chefs. “If you’re a deli, you might want a specific type of bread, or if you’re a restaurant, you may want something really special for the table service,” Allen said. “We really enjoy helping our customers tell their story on the plate; that’s where our passion is. We want to find those people who want to tell stories … it doesn’t have to be our story, but we love helping them tell it.” With that in mind, Companion Baking looks at “artisan” in a different kind of way. The craft is in creating something for customers to make uniquely theirs. One example is a custom hoagie bun. At first glance, it looks like any other one on the market, but it was developed to support a specific po’ boy sandwich only found in two restaurant locations in the country. That’s not just a hoagie; it’s a structure created for one customer’s vision and use. “With terms like ‘craft’ or ‘artisan,’ it’s really about intention,” Allen said. “In that regard, a po’ boy can be just as beautiful as a Tartine loaf.” The bakery’s principles have been a guiding force in not only the extreme changes brought on by the pandemic and supply chain disruption, but also in evolving consumer preferences that often change how some chefs and retailers think about their bread offerings. Take hotel banquet service: In the past, items like table bread and dinner rolls might have been ordered at 2.5-

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Companion Baking also operates two cafes, one of which offers a view for customers to watch the bread being made. It aligns with the root “cum pane,” meaning “with bread.”

times the number of guests. Today, that same order may have a multiplier of 0.2 per guest with a request for higher quality bread. “We have definitely seen a shift to quality over quantity,” Allen said. “People want to eat great sandwiches on interesting breads, and they might choose that over table bread with an entrée. People have become more selective, and they want a better experience.” Delivering that experience often starts with Josh Galliano, innovation leader and QA manager. Before making the move into baking, Galliano was a multi-year James Beard Awardnominated chef ... and Companion Baking customer.

“With semiautomation, the process is interesting to watch because even though we have machines at every stage, guests still get to see our personal interaction with the bread.” Josh Allen | founder | Companion Baking

C O M PA N I O N B A K I N G

FIXING MORE THAN THE TRASH At Companion Baking, there are two topics discussed every day. “We talk about safety,” said founder Josh Allen, “and we talk about trash.”

trash per pound report every month, he noticed he could chart the data. “It turned out that we were creating around 1.6 million pounds of trash a year,” Allen said. “For a business that was making 10 million pounds of product, that was embarrassing. The worst part about generating trash in a bakery is that you’re making something and then throwing it away.”

While talking trash ultimately landed Allen a Tiptree Sustainability Hero World Bread Award, sustainability wasn’t initially the goal. It was strictly a business decision. In 2018, three years after moving into its current facility, Allen was forced to take a hard look at his finances and come up with a way to cut costs, sharply and quickly.

Allen predicted that if he fixed the trash, he could cut costs including labor, ingredients and process.

He was about to sit down with execs from the bank, and in preparation, he looked at data from the bakery’s waste management provider.

In the end, not only was his prediction correct, but he also discovered something that the entire workforce was excited about fixing.

At the previous facility, Allen simply wrote a monthly trash check to the landlord without thinking twice. In looking at the current

In three years, Companion cut its trash by 1 million lbs., and the bakery is on a path toward zero food waste to landfill by 2024.

Because so much of the bakery’s business is developing custom products for specific menu items, Galliano’s experience plays a critical role in not only R&D but also ensuring a smooth transition from sales to operations to, ultimately, the final product. “When our sales team identifies a target, Josh gets involved very quickly,” Allen said. “He can ‘talk the talk,’ so to speak, because that’s where he came from.” Galliano’s relationships and reputation in the culinary world precede him, with credibility that makes him a ringer on the sales side. But it’s that pass-off into product development where his talent truly makes a difference. “I have an understanding of what the food is supposed to be when it goes on or with the bread,” Galliano said. “But we are all a bunch of foodies here, and it’s about collaboration with the customer. A lot of

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

times, it’s the brainstorming that matters most. Sometimes we create something new. Other times, I use my experience to help the team develop new applications for a customer’s existing bread program.” There are specific synergies that come with bringing culinary expertise into a commercial bakery, and along with it, new perspectives on the process. “I brought a restaurant’s sense of urgency into the bakery,” Galliano said. “If something went wrong, I pushed to troubleshoot it very quickly. But at the same time, I also learned a different kind of urgency that comes when a product takes 24 or 26 hours to make. Not everyone had the same kind of rhythm I was used to and melding those worlds together has been really important.” In either world, perfection is the end game, and Galliano’s team knows how to get there.

“When building a team, I look for people who have an understanding of perfection,” Galliano said. “It’s about critical analysis, and I can teach them to think about what happens when we fall short of perfection — what steps can be taken to ameliorate it — so it doesn’t impact the customer.” Galliano also referenced the “yes” mentality as a tool for bringing customer needs to life. These days, that might mean simply getting any available bread delivered so restaurant and retail customers can keep their heads above water amid pandemic-related stresses. “That’s really important because when we can send out a life raft to help our customers just tread water, they know we can keep going with them,” Galliano said. “Then, when those customers are ready to innovate, they know we can help. That’s how we make small, incremental changes that result in big impacts.”

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C O M PA N I O N B A K I N G

Accomplishing these goals doesn’t happen in a vacuum on the plant floor. Companion Baking often looks to tradeshows such as IBIE to discover innovation and inspiration from equipment and ingredient suppliers. It’s also a way for new or inexperienced bakers to gain a deeper knowledge of the process. “We usually bring a handful of folks who are newer to the industry, just to give them an opportunity to walk the floor,” Allen said. “More than anything, I want them to just see what’s out there.” In a time of social distancing, Allen compared IBIE to visiting dozens of bakeries, all at the same time. “It plants a seed for what kind of automation is possible in the future if we end up selling a certain type of product or get that next big customer,” he said. Meanwhile on the home front, Companion Baking most effectively innovates through collaboration with its own supplier network. With AB Mauri

located just 20 minutes down the road, the team can troubleshoot anything from formulating problems such as product performance and shelf life, to optimal mix times for dough development. “Their technicians and engineers have great institutional knowledge,” Galliano said. “They’ve helped us streamline our processes, and that ensures our bakers are using their time wisely.” With a semi-automated operation that produces about 60 batches a day, five days a week, Companion Baking can make around 150 different SKUs, including a variety of custom bread products and a few specialty sweet goods like brownies, gooey butter cake and frozen cookie pucks as well … all in view of the café guests on the other side of windowed walls. “With semi-automation, the process is interesting to watch because even though we have machines at every stage, guests still get to see our personal interaction with the bread,” Allen said.

When Companion moved into its current facility in 2015, the company emphasized safety when considering capital investments, and that still holds true today. In a time when worker retention is critical, this bakery keeps its Companions (the bakery’s term for its workforce) always top of mind. The team invested in MIWE deck and rack oven technology in part for benefits beyond the bake. The deck ovens have robotic infeeds and outfeeds for ease of use, and the rack ovens are equipped with a venting system to extract moisture and heat at the end of the bake cycle, contributing to overall climate control in the bakery. “Before, we would open the oven door and all that steam would come pouring out,” Allen recalled. “Now when Companions open the door, they’re not exposed to that.” The case packing and palletizing room is also a place that has made life easier for the Companions. A collaborative robot assists in palletizing so one person can

Companion Baking’s semiautomated operation combines equipment and a personal touch.

Photo by Liz Goodwin | Commercial Baking

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

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C O M PA N I O N B A K I N G

Founder Josh Allen (featured in front of Companion’s wall of bakery pans) makes sure the bakery addresses two things every day: safety and waste.

INNOVATIONS FROM THE BAKERY FLOOR

Photo by Liz Goodwin |Commercial Baking

The Companion Baking facility in St. Louis isn’t just an operation. It’s a showplace where guests of the adjacent café can watch the art of semi-automated bread baking take place before their eyes. Below is a list of innovations that can be found on this bakery’s floor: Bettendorf Stanford bagging Contimar indoor flour silo Lantech case erecting MIWE fermentation, rack and deck ovens, robotic loading/unloading MMCI Automation robotic palletizing

easily manage it, and labor can be dispersed to other areas of that bakery that are short-handed.

Peerless horizontal mixer for pastry Rheon dough makeup

“This robot is used to working around people, so it doesn’t need the fence around it,” Allen said. “It alleviates a lot of the lifting people were having to endure, and now someone can work by themselves in this area, and we can spread the shift out.”

San Cassiano vertical dough mixers UBE slicing

A focus on safety puts the Companions first, and efficiency becomes a natural byproduct. Companions top the list of the bakery’s core values — Companions, Customers, Community and Company — the “4 Cs” known throughout the bakery. “We’re a family-owned company that has always had roots in the community,” said Donna Wolfersberger, marketing director. “We’ve also focused on developing our values around the community, our customers and our employees. Josh’s father took that philosophy with his business, and Josh has taken the same mindset.”

“It’s the backboard against which we throw every decision,” Allen said. “We make sure we are all in alignment, and it gives us something to think about to ensure we’re going down a path to serve those values.” At the end of that path is one clear conclusion for Allen: “Happy bakers make better bread.” And the better the bread, the better the stories. CB

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Photo by Liz Goodwin | Commercial Baking

Although Companion Baking lives to tell its customers’ stories, the bakery’s brand is still vital, and the “4 Cs” can be seen in every move the company makes.

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BSI ALPS Fully automated line that groups, slices, stacks, and bags most types of buns/rolls at average speeds of 35 to 55 bags/min. High Speed option allows for speeds up to 66 bags/min. Not all products run at the same speeds.

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Life by the Drop With a market strategy almost unheard of for baked goods, lifelong entrepreneur and Last Crumb CEO Matthew Jung is putting cookies on the red carpet. BY J OAN I E S PEN C ER

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FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

EXECUTIVE PROFILE: M AT T H E W J U N G

Matthew Jung is no stranger to startups. He launched his first brand — surfing gear and apparel now owned by Huckberry — when he was 18 while attending Whittier College. Once that entrepreneurial bug sunk its teeth in, it never let go. He has since launched several brands ranging from clothing to skin care, and today, he’s taking the country by storm as CEO of Los Angeles-based Last Crumb, a luxury cookie brand with a direct-to- consumer (DTC) model more typical in the fashion industry than food. Last Crumb sold its first cookie just two months after Jung met founders Derek Jaeger and Alana Arnold. For Jung, a self-proclaimed skeptic, skilled risk taker and disruptor, the opportunity was one he couldn’t pass up. The first meeting was like gasoline on a match, and the rest was fire. “I candidly have no experience with baking, but I have a lot of experience building brands and launching direct to consumer,” Jung said. “Derek told me he wanted to build the ‘Rolex of cookies.’ It was crazy, but that’s what made it so intoxicating.” Presented with nothing more than an amazing brand and what Jung would describe as perfect cookies, he jumped in.

“I created a framework of looking at everything we did through the lens of the consumer experience ... we needed to nail the product, brand and experience.” Matthew Jung | CEO | Last Crumb

These cookies have the same allure of an exclusive Hollywood nightclub, a limited-edition pair of Jordans, or even a Rolex. That’s because Last Crumb goes to market in quite a different way. Oftentimes, DTC companies are marketingfocused, relying on a co-packer or co-manufacturer to make, package and distribute the product. But for the Last Crumb brand, Jung opted for a different method.

For a startup that had no marketing, no social media and no customer list, a drop model could bring people to the brand; Jung trusted that the rest would fall into place. “I created a framework of looking at everything we did through the lens of the consumer experience,” he said. “The physical, digital, product, taste — everything. Then secondly, we had to make sure that if we did that right, it would position us as being seen the way we wanted our brand to be seen. I had a theory that if we focused on those, then sales would come. But we needed to nail the product, brand and experience.” In those terms, the drop model wasn’t the question for this company, but perhaps the answer. It was a means to an end. “The drop model came about because of our constraints,” Jung said. “We could only make so many cookies, and we had to start an email list from scratch. This was an organic way for us to build through the consumer experience and brand, and it allowed us to create the experience we wanted and pay off the brand in a cool and interesting way.” And pay off it has. In just a year, Last Crumb drops sell out in less than a minute — every week — at about $150 for a box of 12 cookies.

“That’s not an uncomfortable place for me — joining something that hasn’t fully taken off yet,” he said.

The company does its own baking, packaging and shipping, and people can only get Last Crumb cookies one way: by waiting.

But that’s not the end of the drop. Through this model, the company controls the pace of its growth while scaling up at the same time.

Less than a year after that first cookie, Jung is changing how consumers access a product once reserved for jars in Grandma’s kitchen, the center aisle of the grocery store or the counter at the local bakery.

The cookies are sold through the drop model, a marketing-style sales method that “drops” limited runs of product — sight unseen — for consumers who sign up online to receive the items on the next run.

With business booming at warp speed — Last Crumb is experiencing years’ worth of growth every few months — Jung has put his 15 years of startup experience into high gear. Only this time, he’s leading a startup he didn’t launch.

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EXECUTIVE PROFILE

Photo courtesy of Last Crumb

“This is the first time I’m running someone else’s company, not one that I started,” Jung said. “It puts me in a unique position because most startups are run by the person who founded them. But I have to credit Derek and Alana for having the wherewithal to say, ‘Maybe we should bring in someone with experience to round out the great things we are already doing.’ That’s been a key to so rapidly propelling our growth. I can see things differently because I don’t have that emotional attachment as a founder.” Although the company had yet to be “born” when Jung took the helm, Jaeger’s and Arnold’s clear vision provided a firm foundation from which Jung could catapult the brand. “Derek and Alana knew exactly what they wanted, and they knew what they wanted the product to be,” he recalled. “The question was, ‘Would anyone else want it?’ I knew the answer was yes, but the risk was not knowing if that would be the case. But we were unapologetically who

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

we were and boldly building the company they wanted.” That risk came with reward. The cookie company recently secured a $1 million injection of capital to continue its trajectory. While Last Crumb is riding the momentum of sellout drops, the innovation doesn’t stop. Jung is using that investment to fuel progress, first by moving out of its commissary and into its own facility 10 times larger. There, it can continue product development, scale up production and upgrade packaging to enhance the already memorable unboxing experience. “We’ve been able to grow demand significantly, keep the momentum going and continue using the drop model while trying other things,” Jung said. “That’s not easy to do. It’s working great for us now and has helped with some of those flywheels of our organic growth.” From Jung’s experience, the success wasn’t necessarily driven by the drop

model. In fact, it might be fair to say that his skepticism played a critical role. After launching nearly half a dozen startups himself, he knows the potential pitfalls that come from those common misconceptions early-stage founders often have. After all, rapid growth is not synonymous with easy growth. Jung and his team — having expanded from three people to 25 in about 10 months — take every step with intention, despite the speed. “Things like, ‘We just need to throw it up online, do some drop models and we’ll make a lot of money,’ those don’t work,” he cautioned. “If it were that easy, I’d be living on a yacht right now. You can’t just build it and expect them to come.” He compared a company taking off faster than expected to a sailboat riding a hurricane. “Everyone is either trying to jump off the boat or change its course, but that won’t work,” he said. “My job is to trust the program and stay the course.” CB

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Ripple in the Chain A look inside how supply chain disruption is impacting end-user behavior … and vice-versa. BY J OAN I E S PEN C ER

Two years into the pandemic and a year after “supply chain” has become a household term, there’s good news for commercial bakeries: Consumers aren’t changing their purchasing habits for baked goods. But there’s also bad news: Consumers aren’t changing their purchasing habits. As bakery manufacturers and their suppliers scramble to increase capacity and get products onto store shelves and affordably into consumers’ hands, inflation and scarcity are met with mixed reactions. Increased demand at the pandemic’s onset certainly played a pivotal role in the supply chain disruption that followed, and as the subsequent inflation occurs, consumers are noticing … in some areas more than others. According to a December consumer survey from IRI, 94% of consumers said they saw an increase in their overall grocery bill compared to the same time last year. That said, when looking at the price of specific items, baked goods didn’t show up on the list until about 10 items down, and that was where about 40% said they noticed an increase in the price of bread.

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“No other baked goods showed up on that list among 25 grocery products,” said Jonna Parker, team lead for IRI Fresh. “What did score much higher were those meal-making items like meat, produce, milk and eggs. Fully finished baked goods, which were part of that list, were not necessarily top-of-mind for consumers.” On one hand, people aren’t feeling the pinch from price increases on bread; that’s great for business. On the other, business isn’t slowing down while bakeries scramble to keep their heads above water. It’s a vicious cycle. So, what can bakers expect from their end-users as they create ripples in the chain? PMMI, the association for packaging and processing, conducts regular research on consumer behavior and its impact on food manufacturing. Its studies have revealed some specific caveats that have surfaced during the past 24 months. Purchases are based on three criteria, according to PMMI research: availability, convenience and value.

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S U P P LY C H A I N

Consumers have, for the most part, eased up on the hoarding from the pandemic’s onset, but as many have shifted to more eating at home, stocking up has become a habit, and that’s causing changes in what’s available — where — and at what cost.

“The main motivator in the super center or club channels is that when you buy something like baked goods, there’s a perception of saving money just by walking in the door,” Parker said. It also provides an opportunity for stocking up, she added.

“I would say in the past month, many people are going to different stores and buying in different channels,” said Jorge Izquierdo, VP of market development for PMMI. “They’re relying more on things like e-commerce for access to specific products that are harder for them to find. In some cases, they have to replace brands they’re used to with other brands because of availability.”

This is reminiscent of the Great Recession, especially in terms of how consumers are willing to accommodate for inflation and why they may not even notice elevated prices on certain items. If they’re used to picking up a muffin at the coffee shop, and now they’re picking up a bulk pack from the club store to enjoy at home, it’s a cost savings, even if those prices went up at the store. Not to mention, it’s an indulgence worth spending for.

Parker noted that as many consumers have settled into a work-from-home lifestyle, consumption of products like breakfast muffins have moved from the coffee shops to the kitchen table. That has triggered increased sales in club and big-box retailers, with a few implications in terms of the perceptions surrounding price and availability.

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“In the Great Recession, lower-cost discretionary spends that gave a feeling of happiness increased,” said Robert Berg, founding member of Iridescent Data. “When you have a small amount of money — a two- or three-dollar difference — you can treat yourself.”

With a perceived savings baked in, club stores obviously experienced growth during the height of the pandemic, and with price and availability so top of mind in the supply chain crisis, that momentum is apt to continue. Loyalty has always been a point of interest for consumer behavior, and over the past year, it has become relative to what’s available and what’s affordable. It could easily trump brand or channel loyalty as people become more skilled at making the best of bad situations. As Izquierdo noted, consumers are using digital platforms to find the brands or specific types of products that might be hard to find on store shelves. Additionally, NielsenIQ noted that ecommerce is alleviating the frustration that comes with product shortages in-store, and gratification is winning over loyalty. The research firm’s Omnichannel Shopping Fundamentals Survey indicated that in April 2021, 36% of consumers made a purchase with no brand, a few brands or a different brand in mind.

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“For the most part, when consumers look for what they want, around 60 percent are finding it. And within any category, less than 10 percent of people are saying, ‘I went to the store, and I didn’t see what I wanted’ … it isn’t as top of mind for consumers today.” Jonna Parker | IRI Fresh

“As consumers become further entrenched in online shopping and its easy product search capabilities, we can only expect the shift toward attribute-based shopping to accelerate,” said Madeline Burbach, communications specialist at NielsenIQ. While longer lead times are forcing commercial bakeries to wait for raw material resources and equipment installations, consumers who are used to omnichannel-style instant gratification may not be as patient. That said, NielsenIQ sales data isn’t reflecting much of a backlash, with products like muffins and dessert bars showing double-digit growth (16.2% and 12.8% respectively) in dollar sales for the 52 weeks ending Jan. 1, 2022, and the overall sweet snacks category experiencing 5.5% growth for the same time period.

When consumers have time to react quickly while bakery and snack manufacturers scramble to keep up, brand loyalty shifts may not be as conspicuous … for now. “The ways consumers have been forced to react is having an impact on brand loyalty, but companies might not be feeling it as much right now because consumption is relatively high,” Izquierdo said. “As consumption levels off and competition increases, those consequences of losing brand loyalty will become significant.”

Izquierdo also pointed to omnichannel and the available options that will create even more shifts in loyalty-driven behavior. Product size, style and brand choices are now paired with a variety of channel options, ranging from brick-and-mortar to click-and-collect, home delivery and online. It’s a multi-layered marketplace that will further complicate the situation for food manufacturers. “These two forces — on one side the brand loyalty, and on the other side the channel competition — are going to create a very different dynamic for manufacturers,” Izquierdo said. “Many will be forced to jump into different channels, while others will have the luxury of just staying in a single distribution channel. But I think they’re all going to be forced to work with different channels in some way, and they’re going to find their operations will need much more flexibility.” According to PMMI’s 2021 State of the Industry Report, end-of-line machinery represents one of the largest equipment categories, with case/tray handling machinery with 36.7% of the category, and labeling, decorating and coding machinery snagging 30.8%.

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From 2015 to 2020, end-of-line equipment experienced a 6.5% CAGR before contending with the supply chain disruption. Consumers are driving these new needs for flexibility at the end of the line, and that growth could intensify in the coming years. As shoppers maintain demand while bakers forge through their challenges, price elasticity comes into question. “Are food manufacturers being forced to, in order to maintain their volume, reduce their price?” Berg asked. “Or do they have to sufficiently increase prices to capture the same revenue profit?”

“It’s my expectation that bakers are probably finding different ways to cut costs in different areas,” Berg suggested. “They’re probably looking at lower-cost options in areas like packaging. The just-in-time manufacturers are ordering more and keeping higher inventories throughout the supply chain, which is also impacting the situation.” When IRI polled consumers about how they planned to respond to increased prices, a third said they don’t really plan to do anything, and about 40% said they’ll look for sales and deals. But, according to Parker, almost no one said they planned to abandon the purchase or the brand altogether. “Part of it is people just knowing and expecting [increased prices],” Parker said. “People are concerned, but I think

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It’s not just price, though. Scarcity is a challenge that baking companies had to immediately address during the hoarding crisis at the onset of the pandemic. While consumers have not again reached that panic level with baked goods, there’s still a decent amount of stocking up occurring. According to IRI proprietary supply data, the overall fast-moving consumer goods market is performing quite well with retailers and manufacturers able to sufficiently adapt to the disruption. Bakery, however, while showing average performance on IRI’s COVID-19 Dashboard, does appear to be slightly lower than total CPG and total edibles on the Supply Index. The in-stock percentage is trending downward slightly in recent weeks as well. Those numbers aren’t cause for alarm, considering that shortages — when they do happen — are nowhere near what they were two years ago. “For the most part, when consumers look for what they want, around 60 percent are finding it,” Parker said. “And within any category, less than 10 percent of people are saying, ‘I went to the store, and I didn’t see what I wanted’ … it isn’t as top of mind for consumers today.” Over the past 18 to 24 months, consumers have also learned new shopping habits to accommodate when their favorite products aren’t available. When it comes to essential items, Parker noted,

about a third of shoppers will visit another store if the item they need is out of stock, and a third will buy a different variety. “Then there’s another strategy that, I think, is becoming more commonplace, and that is people will go back on another trip,” she observed. “That didn’t happen early in the pandemic, but it’s happening more now. There is some changing of stores, but there’s also more variety seeking or just delaying the purchase.” All things considered, in the grand scheme of this disruption, the demandside of the supply chain is still healthy. That might not feel like good news to the bakers who are struggling to keep up, but in looking at the overall health of the industry and thinking about where to go from here, it’s certainly the bettercase scenario. CB

Clearly this isn’t an impact of one ingredient or factor in the process; bakers are struggling with every aspect of their manufacturing, and it’s going to take significant research to understand the elasticity of baked goods as a result of this end-to-end disruption.

bakeries should price fairly and think about how consumers are trading out within categories like breakfast or bread. They also need to consider that interplay of different products or sizes and variety, because that’s more likely where the consumer response will be rather than fully leaving baked goods in general.”

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Bakery’s Clean Break How clean label baked goods with simple ingredients are maintaining popularity and profit. BY LIZ GOO DWI N

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4 44 4

P R O D U C T D E V E L O P M E N T: CLEAN LABEL

“I’m going to start eating cleaner.” It’s a common mantra at the turn of a year or when summer approaches, and the word “clean” is one that consumers are focusing on in multiple ways. Clean label, the food movement that preaches products without artificial chemicals, continues to rise in popularity with shoppers, and it’s proving that short ingredient lists (especially with names the common person can pronounce) pay off. But trendy as the movement is, it still has many questions surrounding it, including the most basic: What exactly is clean label, and who decides whether something is “clean enough” to make the cut? Although there is no universal rulebook on what is required for a product to be considered clean label, a general rule of thumb is that the ingredient list needs to be short and relatively simple. This usually means nixing preservatives and artificial colors and flavors, all while keeping the same taste and texture consumers love. Although it’s a tall order for bakery producers, it’s a force to be reckoned with in the grocery aisles: Forty-eight percent of global consumers say they make proactive health and wellness choices on a regular basis, according to NielsenIQ, and 77% of consumers expect product labels to be more specific and transparent.

and snack producers create their own path in the clean label space. “I approach it as partnering with customers to understand how they want to look at the label for their own differentiation,” she said. “A big trend in formulating is ‘choice goal,’ and clean label is huge at choice goal, though we don’t put a hard definition out on the topic.”

77%

of consumers expect product labels to be more specific and transparent. Source: NielsenIQ

A choice goal is a consumer behavior concept that is critical to pinning down ways to get your product noticed. IGI Global defines choice goal as a benchmark that people want to attain during product selection, which can in turn determine their satisfaction with the decision-making process. For example, if a consumer has a goal to be more conscious of ingredient lists in their snack choices, a clean label product would gain the attention (and the dollar) of that shopper. They will feel good about the purchase because it met their goal, and hopefully come back for more. A common way for brands to get themselves into many consumers’ choice goal categories is by being open about what’s in their product. Despite the ambiguity around clean label’s true definition, one thing is crystal clear: A straightforward label strengthens the chances of a consumer deciding to press “add to cart.” “For some, clean label is just about transparency,” Halliburton said. “They want to know where products come from and what they do. They don’t want to feel like they’re being tricked or that there’s something heavier in there.”

Gone are the days where uber-clean products were a niche market; they have been propelled into the mainstream, now more of a standard than a specialty. Jennifer Halliburton, Corbion Global Bakery Insights senior manager, has spent much of her career figuring out how to conquer clean label. She said that in a world where the rules are ambiguous, its best to let bakers

One brand that taps into the “transparency tactic” is Waterville, ME-based Maine Crisp Co. The clean label and gluten-free crisp brand uses buckwheat flour in its products,

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CLEAN LABEL

“Our product’s clean label helps us successfully straddle the gluten-free market ... and the artisanal crisp market, where our gluten-free certification is a differentiator.” Karen Getz | founder and president | Maine Crisp Co.

Caption about Maine Crisp Co. here

allowing for a balanced taste that doesn’t require extra flavoring agents. “Our product’s clean label helps us successfully straddle the glutenfree market, where our flavors stand out, and the artisanal crisp market, where our gluten-free certification is a differentiator,” said Karen Getz, founder and president of Maine Crisp Co. “We’ve recently found that store buyers, customers and nutritionists look at our label and are happy to see that we use buckwheat flour instead of rice, starches and gums as binders, so we will continue to emphasize that in our marketing strategy. “ While ingredient openness is becoming gospel for so many food producers, one retail outlet is often deemed the

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pioneer of the clean label movement: Whole Foods. The health food giant that offers an organic option for nearly everything has a list of more than 230 ingredients — including hydrogenated fats, high-fructose corn syrup, and sweeteners such as aspartame, sucralose and saccharin — banned from the products on its shelves. When it comes to developing a clean label product, earning a place in the aisles of Whole Foods’ serves as a golden ticket. Two key categories that Whole Foods focuses on, both of which are particularly relevant to the baking industry, are preservatives and sweeteners. The grocer states on its website that preservatives undergo consideration on a case-by-case basis, “weighing the benefits and the drawbacks.”

The company allows things like citric acid and cultured dextrose but bans benzoates and three sorbate varieties: calcium, potassium and sodium, all common preservatives in baked goods. Without these elements, shelf life is shortened, so bakers have to figure out how to either go without preservatives and make a shorter shelf life profitable or replace them with clean label options. According to a report from Allied Market Research, the natural food preservatives market is predicted to reach $1.07 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 3.7% from 2019 to 2026. The top contributors to the market included salt, an ancient and costefficient preservative, and citric acid, found naturally in citrus fruits and widely used as an acidifier in foods.

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CLEAN LABEL

Even seaweed and other algae-derived ingredients have been popular contenders in the natural preservative market for their antibacterial and mold-inhibiting qualities. The other category ripe for clean label innovation is sweeteners. Consumers are increasingly turning to natural sugars rather than chemical ones; in fact, Statista reported that by 2026, the natural sweetener market is projected to reach $28 million — up $5.5 billion from 2020. Popular options include stevia, monk fruit extract, agave, honey, tapioca syrup and brown rice syrup. Riceworks, a clean label brand owned by the company Wholesome Goodness, is no stranger to clean sweeteners. The parent company has banned 158 additives and chemicals and uses only non-GMO ingredients. The brand makes savory rice chips and omega-3 bars, the latter of which brings a sweet taste without any added sugars like fructose. In general, if it ends in a “tose,” it doesn’t belong on a Riceworks ingredient label.

really going to be the most compatible with consumers in a purchasing event,” she said. Once a bakery has nailed down the right formulation, the other piece is marketing the product. Since there is a lack of clear guidelines on how to define clean label, front-of-pack claims can be a bit tricky. Even the word “healthy” has hurdles to navigate. In a statement published by the FDA in May 2021, the organization announced it was beginning to update the “healthy” nutrient content claim for food labeling, something that has a big impact on the clean label movement that falls under a health and wellness halo. The updating process is part of an overall plan, otherwise known as the Nutrition Innovation Strategy, to provide consumers with more information about what they are eating.

“Not all sugars are created equal,” said Rick Letizia, Wholesome Goodness’ co-founder, president and COO. “We use natural sugars in our bars such as natural fruit. And now you have a new category [on the ingredient label] that says added sugars because you have naturally occurring sugar in items like a tomato or something. So now, you really have to look at what kind of ingredient is driving sugar content.” Photo courtesy of Riceworks

Halliburton added that these kind of formulation challenges can be tough, but can also present opportunity. “It can present some confusion, but it also allows bakeries to figure out what’s

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CLEAN LABEL

This is one of the many regulatory concerns that food producers face when navigating the clean label space. Letizia knows firsthand how important these factors are when deciding what to put on the packaging of a product. “There are a lot of regulations coming out that are getting very restrictive with what you can put on the front of a package,” he said. “The FDA is really trying to stop what they believe is misleading labeling. A lot of the language is changing, so the FDA is cleaning that up and we are following along with that, only putting the major type of clean claims that you can make on the packaging.” Letizia and his colleague Jeff Posner, CEO of Wholesome Goodness, are navigating this by focusing on what they include rather than what they exclude. This allows them to make those more “clean cut” claims such as gluten-free, celiac-friendly, free of cholesterol, and non-GMO ingredients, but they also put a spotlight on the inclusion of better ingredients. One of those inclusions is 15 grams of whole grains, a simple callout of better-for-you attributes.

the symbol helps set the bars apart from the competition.

“We’re truly betterfor-you, and that is what we aspire to be. It can’t be solely defined by eliminating the bad stuff. There’s got to be a corollary that we are including the good stuff, which is really at the core of our concept.” Jeff Posner | CEO | Wholesome Goodness

“It was done for consumer communications marketing purposes, and our analogy was like how a computer is powered by Intel,” Posner said. “Our bars are nutritionally powered by O3MG. And that’s something on which we can really build brand equity. It speaks to the consumer, and we are considering a line extension of our chips to be O3MG as well. That means adding ingredients whether they be quinoa, chia seeds or flax. We think omega-3 is where the consumer is going.” And as consumers increasingly shop online, it’s critically important for a brand to differentiate itself against the plethora of options. “With omnichannel and online, this idea of having front-of-pack callouts and how you can find products is becoming more important,” Halliburton said. “How do you talk about the function or the elements of a product differently so that it does show up when traditional shopping is changing?”

“We’re truly better-for-you, and that is what we aspire to be,” Posner said. “It can’t be solely defined by eliminating the bad stuff. There’s got to be a corollary that we are including the good stuff, which is really at the core of our concept that is nutritional density. So you have to think about how you will communicate that to a consumer.”

As clean label enjoys its time in the culinary limelight, all signs point to even more acceleration for the market. Emerging alternative ingredients that can help bakeries make cleaner products appear to be rolling out almost daily as baking companies increase their demand for clean, label-friendly ingredients.

One way Wholesome Goodness sets its baked omega-3 bars apart is with its signature “O3MG powered” branding. The registered acronym stands for omega-3, multigrain and gluten-free, and

“It’s a space that is going to continue to evolve,” Halliburton said. “It’s going to be important to consumers when they think about what they need from their food and food security.” CB

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At Lesaffre, we don’t just displace and replace ingredients; we improve product performance and sensory experience. With our clean label antimicrobial and textural shelf life extension technologies, we make baked goods taste fresher, longer – using only enzymes and fermented ingredient blends. In fact, we’ve increased the shelf life of commercial bread from 14 to 30 days and created donuts that stayed fresh and soft for twice as long.

More than three quarters of consumers think ingredient lists are important. Whether you’re making breads, buns, rolls, muffins, or other baked goods, Lesaffre’s portfolio of clean label ESL solutions can make sure customers like what they see (and don’t!) on your label.

With Lesaffre, you can find the ideal balance between good-tasting and long-lasting, with a clean label.

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : B R E A D

Staples holding steady TOTAL CENTER STORE BAKERY AISLE

ALL BREAD AND ROLL PRODUCTS

DOLLAR SALES ($ IN BILLIONS)

% CHANGE VS. A YEAR AGO

$23.76

1.1%

$15.91

-1.1%

BREAD

$8.91

-2.7%

BUNS | ROLLS

$4.54

-0.3%

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

Nine out of 10 consumers are concerned about rising food costs, and 42% are taking note of higher bread prices. Source: IRI

Despite being hobbled by supply chain disruptions and the ongoing worker shortages, bread sales are solid — though not at the sky-high levels seen in 2020. In fact, consumers and bakery producers alike may be feeling a tinge of Deja-vu as a new coronavirus variant is impacting bakery manufactures and consumers at the grocery store. But this time around, those looking to escape the pandemic loop must deal with the added pressures that inflation brings. The increase in the consumer price index was 6.8% for the 12 months ending Nov. 2021, and this go-around everyone is feeling the pinch with the highest increase since June 1982. IRI’s Shopper Survey from December 2021 found inflation is top of mind for consumers, with nine of 10 concerned about rising food costs. Forty-two percent of those surveyed noted higher bread prices, which are being felt on all sides. In the latest four weeks ending Dec. 26, the bakery department average base price per unit was up 7%. In 2021 dollar sales for national brands were flat — but up 15.7% vs. 2019 — while private-label fresh bread and rolls declined. Dollar sales were down 6.6% vs. 2020 and down 8.0% vs. 2019.

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : B R E A D

However, dollar sales of bakery in the total center store rose to $23.8 billion, up $26.4 million vs. a year ago and realizing a dollar-sales change of 1.1% YTD. The sales percent-change vs. 2019 was 11.6%. Center-store sales of bread and rolls reached $16 billion, a 1.1% dollar sales drop vs. a year ago, with a dollar sales decline by $184. 5 million. The perimeter remains the place for consumers looking for freshness and local options in sizes suitable for anything from a single meal to large celebrations. With more consumers getting back to in-person gatherings, perimeter sales remain on the rebound with some growth and recovery after facing pandemic-driven challenges in 2020. Bakery dollar sales in the perimeter of breads and rolls were $3.25 billion, up $186.1 million from a year ago and having a corresponding 6.1% dollar sales bump compared to last year. Perimeter breads saw dollar sales of $1.37 billion, a dollar sales change of $16.4 million, or 1.2%. Bagels and bialys also realized some growth since last year. Sales were up 8.7% vs. a year ago, and perimeter buns and rolls also saw a 5.8% bump in dollar sales compared to last year. But the biggest bakery perimeter changes were in croissants, with a 19.8% increase in dollar sales compared to last year and a $83.5 million dollar sales change vs. a year ago. Perimeter morning bakery also saw strong growth with an increase of 13.8% in dollar sales, a $440.4 million change vs. a year ago. Despite sales growth in many of these sectors, consumers are keeping a close eye on their spending. The ever- e ncroaching reality of inflationary pressure continues to impact the shopping behavior of consumers with

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

DOLLAR SALES ($ IN BILLIONS)

% CHANGE VS. A YEAR AGO

$15.70

11.9%

ALL BREAD AND ROLL PRODUCTS

$3.25

6.1%

BREAD

$1.37

1.2%

BUNS | ROLLS

$0.85

5.8%

TOTAL PERIMETER BAKERY AISLE

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

45% looking for sales and deals more often. This new price sensitivity also finds 33% of shoppers reducing non- essential purchases, 20% opting for private label or lower-cost brands, and 13% switching to lower-cost retailers. Though access to such purchases depends on availability in store, the IRI survey found 8% of consumers were not able to find the product they were looking for, forcing them to choose an alternative. Contributing factors include supply chain, inventory issues and ongoing workforce shortages. The current environment is also a witness to continuing interest in health and wellness, particularly with the spread of the latest COVID19 variant. With an updated focus on immunity, breads with ingredient lists boasting healthy seeds, ginger and turmeric are warranting another look as are the claims breads carry.

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : B R E A D

Those health-and-wellness claims remain strong across several c ategories. Dollar sales growth in non-GMO products was up 41%; vegan/ vegetarian up 31.4%; reduced sugar up 29.2%; organic up 26.7%; gluten-free up 15.2% and no artificial preservatives up 12.4%, according to IRI data. A bakery trend report from Glanbia Nutritionals found that 28% of consumers look for low-sugar claims on bread, but only 4% of bakery products globally make a low-sugar, no-sugar or reduced sugar claim. Well-known, national and premium players such as King’s Hawaiian, Thomas’ Bagels, Nature’s Own Perfectly Crafted, Delightful by Sara Lee, Dave’s Killer Bread, Lewis Bake Shop Health Life, Rustik and Sara Lee Artesano are just a few examples of brands offering products emphasizing better wellbeing through premium food options. These healthy options also extend to the frozen aisle, where consumers can find brands touting health-and-wellness traits such as sprouted grains, gluten-free, non-GMO and organic. Although IRI data revealed that the smaller segment was essentially flat in 2021 vs. 2020, frozen bread continues to be elevated above 2019 with dollar sales up 15.4%. The frozen side shows promise, but it does not play a significant role in the category. Glanbia Nutritionals also cited the emergence of seeds as an alternative to wheat, providing support for gluten-free formulations and adding enticing textures and flavors. New launches using sunflower seed flour, which delivers both protein and unsaturated fats, grew 47% from May 2018 to April 2021. Use of linseed flour was up 12% and sesame flour use was up 7%.

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Dollar sales growth was up for...

41% non-GMO products

29.2%

31.4% vegetarian/ vegan

reduced sugar

26.7% organic

15.2% gluten-free

12.4% no artificial preservatives

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : B R E A D

Conversely, smaller counts and sizes are not taking hold. Despite decreasing household sizes, down from 3.7 people in the 1960s to 3.15 people in 2020, and success in smaller sizes in other food c ategories, smaller counts aren’t profitable with already razor-thin margins. “Smaller sizes can meet the needs of smaller households; however, I don’t anticipate it being a significant contributor to category growth, said Tim Grzebinski, client insights p rincipal, dairy and bakery, IRI. “Half loaves are not as profitable and may not be a focus area for many bakery companies.”

33.3% 20% 13%

“With cost of goods on the rise, we may start seeing a shift from premium products to midtiered and value brands.” Tim Grzebinski | client insights principal, dairy and bakery | IRI

of shoppers are reducing non-essential purchases. are opting for private label or lower cost brands. are switching to lower-cost retailers.

“With cost of goods on the rise, we may start seeing a shift from premium products to mid-tiered and value brands,” Grzebinski said. “Retailers will want an assortment that offers those consumers seeking value options without sacrificing quality.” CB

Source: IRI

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

With so many changes in the mix, it will be important for manufacturers to accommodate consumers experiencing increased price sensitivity with options like coupons and promotions. Compromises and tradeoffs will also be necessary to make the most of available plant staff. This could take the form of streamlining SKUs or larger manufacturers partnering with smaller bakeries to produce specialty SKUs and line extensions that are outside the bandwidth of the larger bakery.

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : D O N U T S

Hole in one Center Store Morning Bakery Dollar Share

Donuts: they’re not just for breakfast anymore. Consumers in search of a sweet treat are finding more reasons to indulge.

PASTRY | DANISH | COFFEE CAKES: 29.7%

DONUTS: 45.2%

The donut market is poised to grow by $5.69 billion from 2020 to 2024, with a CAGR of 4%, according to Market Watch. Fortune Business Insights attributes growth in the North A merican donut market to a growing appetite for indulgence, a desire for foods that provide comfort and a rise in stress eating among consumers. Despite this, donut sales growth is slowing down in center store. Dollar sales of center store donuts were $1.8 billion, an increase of $55.4 million versus a year ago. For the latest 52 weeks, dollar sales are up 3.3% YTD and up 10.2% compared to 2019. But unit sales are down 1.3% compared to 2020 and 1.6% compared to 2019.

MUFFINS: 2 5 .1 %

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

As consumers venture back to browse and shop in-store, there’s been a rebound in perimeter donut sales. In the latest 52 weeks, dollar sales are up 11.1% compared to 2020, but the category has yet to achieve 2019 levels with dollar sales still down 9.7% from that time.

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : D O N U T S

Dollar sales of perimeter donuts were slightly lower at $1.1 billion, a change of $106.3 million vs. 2020. But there is growth in perimeter single-serve donuts, with sales up 15.6% compared to last year and up 5.8% compared to two years ago. From a unit perspective, single serve still hasn’t caught up to sales from 2019 being down 16.6%. This lag can in part be attributed to delays in reopening of the perimeter bakery, difficulty in staffing the department and a cautious return to the sale of self-serve single items. Many bakery departments have kept the category from stagnating by offering pre-boxed options in a variety of sizes that consumers can easily graband-go during the weekly shopping trip.

cinnamon sugar cake, strawberry cake and seasonal standby pumpkin spice. Mintel’s Prepared Cakes, Pies and Pastries US 2021 report found donut holes to be a perfect all-day indulgence with increased consumption happening as the day progresses. Twenty-four percent of those surveyed use sweet baked goods as a morning snack, 37% use donut holes as an afternoon snack and 41% indulge as an evening snack. While many choose to focus on permissible indulgence, others are branching into health and wellness.

CURRENT DOLLAR SALES ($ IN BILLIONS)

DOLLAR SALES CHANGE VS. A YEAR AGO ($ IN MILLIONS)

CENTER STORE

$1.75

$55.45

PERIMETER

$1.06

$106.25

% CHANGE VS. A YEAR AGO

% CHANGE VS. TWO YEARS AGO

CENTER STORE

3.3%

10.2%

PERIMETER

11.1%

-9.7%

“Finding consistent, high-quality labor is expected to continue to challenge retail bakery/foodservice,” said Tim Grzebinski, client insights principal, dairy and bakery for IRI. “This focus will shift to a focused assortment and could create reductions in variety.”

DONUTS DOLLAR SALES

Consumers looking to curb their shopping trips may rely on additional planning and lists, which could impact impulse purchases. Then again, they’re also making room on the list for a permissible indulgence. That can come in smaller and mini-sized offerings. This also provides planned indulgence while meeting a demand for convenient, on-the-go eating. Donuts can meet that demand, but that means they must be kept on the shopping list. That starts with a shift in one’s outlook on daypart. Products such as donut holes make a perfect all-day snacking indulgence as evidenced by the increase in donut hole unit sales, up 2% compared to a year ago. Branching out beyond the traditional, new indulgent donut hole flavors include chocolate cake,

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

DONUTS DOLLAR SALES DIFFERENCE

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : D O N U T S

immunity-boosting foods through spices and citrus that combine great taste and functional ingredients such as vitamin C, apple cider vinegar, dark chocolate, ginger, green tea and turmeric. When looking to tempt consumers with delicious baked goods, Mintel’s Pastries report suggests consumers are looking to experiment with unique flavors (42%), seasonal flavors (36%) and single-serving sizes (33%). In the center store, Tastykake, manufactured by Thomasville, GA-based Flowers Foods, launched limited edition Black & White Mini Donuts, a powdered sugar-coated chocolate cake donut that was available from December through February. Other big names in donuts are also finding success in seasonal and limited offerings. Trendhunter.com, the world’s largest trend community, regularly features innovations from donut leaders such as Krispy Kreme and Dunkin’ Donuts. In November, Krispy Kreme kicked off the fall season with a donut-inspired cinnamon roll in Original Glazed and Cinnamon Toast Crunch. This was followed by a Thanksgiving-themed launch of “Gobbles of Gratitude,” which included donuts in Pecan Pie, Cranberry Orange, Dutch Apple Pie and a heart-shaped Gobbler donut with Thanksgiving sprinkles and a turkey face fondant piece. As “the world runs on Dunkin’,” the company is expanding its donut lineup by introducing global flavors. In the past, this included c aramel-filled Dutch pastries dipped in chocolate and garnished with a waffle cookie. Its Rocky Road donut, found in the UK and Europe, is a chocolate-filled yeast donut with chocolate icing topped with biscuit crumbs and mini marshmallows.

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Perimeter Morning Bakery Dollar Share

DONUTS: 29.3%

PASTRY | DANISH | COFFEE CAKES: 43.3%

MUFFINS: 2 7. 4 %

Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

Consumers are looking to experiment with unique flavors (42%), seasonal flavors (36%) and singleserving sizes (33%). Source: Mintel

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C AT E G O R Y O U T L O O K : D O N U T S

Single-serve donut sales are up

15.6% compared to last year and up

5.8% compared to two years ago.

From a unit perspective, single serve still hasn’t caught up to sales from 2019 being down 16.6%. Source: IRI Total US - Multi Outlet w/ C-Store Latest 52 weeks ending Dec. 26, 2021

Donuts and other baked goods can also benefit from a focus on visual appeal and creative merchandising. This includes an emphasis on secondary locations, increased trade promotions and an intent to grow channels, including online. Although donuts do not over-index with any particular demographic, Grzebinski pointed out that the category could benefit from an infusion of new blood. Adding ingredients with global inspiration such as moringa,

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

“Finding consistent,highquality labor is expected to continue to challenge retail bakery/foodservice. This focus ... could create reductions in variety.” Tim Grzebinski | client insights principal, dairy and bakery | IRI

mochi, ginseng, ginger, turmeric, cacao, yuzu and matcha could be the ticket to capturing a larger share of the growing Gen Z demographic. Additionally, products with purpose are still a natural draw for younger shoppers with higher purchasing power and could provide an opening for donut producers to renew their focus on authenticity, transparency and sustainability moving forward. CB

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: ARTISAN BREAD

Conquering the crust BY LIZ GOO DWI N

During each stage of the pandemic, one thing has been there through it all: carbohydrates.

But as the world settles into life in COVID-limbo, consumers have come to a crossroads. They no longer have the time to make their own bread, but they still crave that fresh taste. Bakers around the country are answering that call, determined to maintain premium artisan quality while getting it to consumers in a convenient manner. There are challenges along the way, but artisan bread bakers are working with other members of the industry to forge ahead and break ground on new opportunities. The mission is simple: Put better bread into the hands of the people.

Photo courtesy of Chabaso Bakery

But not just any carbs. Crusty, beggingto - b e - s l ath e re d - i n - b u t te r- a n d - j a m artisan bread carbs. The world shut down and boredom levels went up, resulting in a surge of home baking and launching sourdough bread to the top recipe search on Google. Tik Toks were made, starter tips were shared, focaccia was meticulously decorated with vibrant vegetables. And most importantly, consumer expectations for taste and texture went past the point of no return. It was the dawn of a new bread era.

Perhaps the biggest challenge of artisan bread production is locking small-batch quality into a large-scale operation. Commercial bakeries need the efficiency of machinery for time and output’s sake, but they don’t want to lose the gentle dough handling that comes from a human hand. Charles Negaro Jr., CEO of New Haven, CT-based Chabaso Bakery, has seen his bakery’s operation at all stages of growth, and he’s found the sweet spot between culinary art and mechanical engineering.

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: ARTISAN BREAD

Photo courtesy of Chabaso Bakery

“When I started here 16 years ago, everything was handmade — we were making ciabatta on a big table and throwing the dough across the room,” he said. “We’ve come a long way since then. Now we can actually make what we call ‘better than handmade’ bread because certain machines can be gentler and a lot more consistent.” The reason gentle dough handling is so critical is because you don’t want to undo all the work you’ve put in through the (at times painstakingly) slow fermentation process. Unlike a no-time dough, artisan bread often goes through bulk fermentation that creates gas bubbles. Those bubbles need to be preserved through the time on the line and into the oven; otherwise, you miss out on that signature texture that makes great bread, well, great.

“Our labels always have very few ingredients on them. And when we put our consumer hat on, we can do sliced bread with a lot fewer ingredients than the ones with 21 days of shelf life. It’s just driven by the bread that we want to eat.” Charles Negaro Jr. | CEO | Chabaso Bakery

“That’s the big challenge that artisan has gone through over the past 20 to

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

30 years,” Negaro said. “You put all this time and energy into making a beautiful, gassy dough, and you’ve got to turn it into a loaf without de-gassing it. A lot of manufacturers are now starting to consider time on the line as bulk fermentation time, which is really smart because you can make that dough band and bulk ferment at the same time, which increases your consistency.” These aspects have also been top of mind for Tasos Katsaounis, CEO and founder of Houston-based Bread Man Baking Co. The bakery is fresh off a major expansion — increasing its squarefootage 10 times over — and his thoughts have been dominated by maintaining product quality while making the right investments on the equipment side. “When you scale, you might experience a bit of degradation in quality,” Katsaounis said. “But we pride ourselves on having the privilege of using the moniker of

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: ARTISAN BREAD

‘artisan bakery.’ Because of that, we were looking at anything and everything we could to take advantage of the technology that exists today to help us scale and meet demand, but also to do it where we’re not shortcutting.”

The Bread Man team was laser-focused on acquiring a line that could run all its artisan products, a quality mixer and a stress-free dough processing system. The bakery uses a stone deck hearth oven for its artisan breads, which is something Katsaounis didn’t plan on letting go as the operation expanded. He asked himself, ”Do I want people to notice the shift because the quality dipped, or because the bread they fell in love with to begin with is in more places?” Flexibility is another key aspect to smooth production in an artisan bread bakery. At Chabaso, creativity comes through flexibility with a bread’s structure. When a new trend comes along, Negaro said you might have to, in the spirit of a bread analogy, figure out how to take a loaf-shaped peg and put it into a bouleshaped hole. “You usually can do that, but there are challenges,” he said. “If you want a flexible bakery, you need to have a well-defined process and product architecture so you can figure out how to [tweak it]. Every single product doesn’t have to be a revolution; you just need to find those variables that make sense. For us, it still has to fit into our Chabaso ethos.” A core component of that ethos is using quality ingredients, which is something that Chabaso and Bread Man Baking have in common. Reed Immer, sales and marketing director at Chabaso, said that a shift to better ingredients remains a big focus for the team now and over the past few years.

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: ARTISAN BREAD The bakery is working toward using the cleanest ingredients possible for its entire portfolio including sliced bread, something that is important to Negaro and the rest of the staff. “Most sliced breads have an approximate bajillion days of shelf life, and getting sliced bread into the in-store bakery is always challenging, but it’s been successful,” Negaro said. “Our labels always have very few ingredients on them. And when we put our consumer hat on, we can do sliced bread with a lot fewer ingredients than the ones with 21 days of shelf life. It’s just driven by the bread that we want to eat.”

As these bakeries expand their business, they’re eager to keep the things they are known for, but they also are looking to strategically roll out new artisan products. Chabaso has a unique testing outlet with its sister business Atticus, a retail microbakery also located in New Haven. In addition to helping other Connecticut food businesses commercialize their products, the team also gets to test out its latest creations in the consumer market before mass producing them.

Photo courtesy of Bread Man Baking

Bread Man Baking has a similar philosophy when it comes to choosing ingredients. Katsaounis said that the team doesn’t use any chemical-based preservatives or conditioners, and their breads are also non-GMO. That does mean the product is going to have a shorter shelf-life, but it doesn’t bother him much.

foodservice sides, and that presents even more opportunities to bring Bread Man’s high-quality goods to new places.

“It matters what you are putting into that bread,” Katsaounis said. “We don’t skimp on ingredients. And on top of that, I have two very talented guys leading our operation. Our director of operations just has artisan bread flowing through him; he is so scientifically intelligent. I have guys like that, who understand and respect the process of artisan, non-GMO bread. Pairing that with high-quality ingredients and a production facility that’s equipped properly, that’s where you start seeing a consistent product that your customers expect to pay for.” One way to preserve that quality is, of course, by freezing it. Bread Man Baking is dipping its toe into that pond for the first time with blast-freezing technology. The business has seen an uptick in demand for frozen offerings on both the retail and

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: ARTISAN BREAD “Atticus has served as a sort of baking lab for Chabaso,” Immer said. “We are able to do this specialty stuff on a small scale, and we’ve learned a lot there. We see opportunities to bring some of those aspects into the Chabaso production.” Katsaounis also hopes to break into new markets with the right equipment. His next goal is to perfect more artisan buns and rolls. He loves what he calls the “sexy crusty stuff,” but he also knows there’s more out there to be conquered. “I would love to see the ability to find innovation transitioning toward the artisan manufacturer,” he said. “It’s the fastest growing segment in the industry, and I’d love to see the technology flowing with that. There are so many other breads we want to make.” CB

“We pride ourselves on having the privilege of using the moniker of ‘artisan bakery’. Because of that, we were looking at anything and everything we could to take advantage of the technology that exists today to help us scale and meet demand, but also to do it where we’re not shortcutting.” Tasos Katsaounis | CEO and founder | Bread Man Baking Co.

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: D O N U T S

Hitting the sweet spot BY LIZ GOO DWI N

Photo courtesy of Mel-O-Cream

When the term “old fashioned” collides with the modern world of food, the donut immediately comes to mind. A darling for multiple generations, donuts are nostalgia personified: the Sunday morning sweet, a champion of rainbow sprinkles and a versatile vehicle for fruity and chocolate flavors alike. Moms love them, grandparents love them, and, of course kids love them. This sweet good appeases all ages.

But make no mistake — this classic pastry is by no means stagnant. It straddles the line of timeless and cuttingedge, featuring flavors from Boston cream to matcha passion fruit, and producers are figuring out how to get the best of both worlds. But with all the hurdles that come with running a business in this time, it’s no small feat. Here’s how different donut bakeries are working to find their production sweet spot.

Perhaps one of the greatest advantages of donuts is the wide range of flavors available to experiment with. While favorites such as jelly-filled and classic glazed maintain their grip, consumers are also more open to trying different variations. But just because the options exist doesn’t mean its easy to bring them to fruition. Donut producers, just like every other business in this country, are struggling to find people to move that experimentation along.

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: D O N U T S

Photo courtesy of UDF Bakery

And with the labor crisis persisting in 2022, bakeries have had to shift their production strategy. Chad Larson, VP and COO of Springfield, IL-based Mel-O-Cream Donuts International, knows firsthand how hard it is to find people to work. “It’s the biggest challenge that baking manufacturers face, and I could never have said that two years ago,” he said. “It’s really changed how we look at our needs, so as we figure out how to move forward, now we’re asking how we can automate that process.” Automation has become essential for many bakeries, donut makers included. It’s an initiative that’s also imperative to the team at Cincinnati-based United

FEBRUARY 2022 Q1

Dairy Farmers (UDF), manufacturers of both ice cream and donuts. The operation went from seven days a week down to a low of just five due to COVID-related challenges, but now the bakery is back at its full seven days a week production and delivery schedule. The bakery was able to keep all its employees working throughout the pandemic by transferring some w orkers to ice cream production, but it’s also brought in some robots to help carry the weight.

to explore ways to further automate out production and picking process.”

“We roughly make anywhere between 25,000 to 30,000 donuts a day,” said Henry Lopez, plant manager of UDF Bakery. “It was a challenge at that level of volume to get all our different tasks done. And with only 18 people each day, its pretty well automated. We continue

“If you’ve got a flat sheet running down a line and you’re cutting round donuts, you’re generating much more scrap dough that you have to do something with,” Lopez said. “But you could generate so much scrap that it starts to affect the product quality when you [rework it].

UDF also has an advantage when it comes to humans and machines living in harmony: It creates less waste. The bakery is known for its unique items such as square donuts among other specialty products, which minimize the amount of scrap when it’s being cut from a sheet on its Rademaker continuous sheeter line. The signature look is a great bonus, too.

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C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: D O N U T S

We only like to put 20 percent rework in our donuts for flavor, and because our products are square, there’s very little from a scrap standpoint.” Mel-O-Cream is under those same volumetric pressures for even more types of donuts. And it can be quite the puzzle when it comes to bringing the automation it needs from an output standpoint together with the optimal flexibility of human hands. “We have a large diversity of products that we produce because customers expect a lot of different sizes and flavors,” Larson said. “When you look at automation, how does that fit into the complexity of manufacturing? You’ve got some stuff that’s straightforward, but one size doesn’t fit all. When you get into the speed at which you need to change things and be flexible, that’s what the next big puzzle piece is for everyone in our world.”

“It can be an exorbitant amount of money to invest for the amount of volume you have against it as you start to look at the cost benefit and ROI of things,” Larson said. “It can be a tough sell.

Hostess, the Lenexa, KS-based bakery behind the classic powdered donuts dear to the hearts of c-store shoppers, also juggles a wide range of product variety.

tion process? This is something Mel-OCream is thinking about, especially when it comes to filled products. Automation designed for donut filling is out there, but when a bakery is making a full suite of products, it can become a small percent of the total product base, making it easy for the bet to be worth more than the hand. But the team has been able to find a custom-fit formula when it comes to automation through working with companies such as Moline.

“Each of our donut products, which include more than 15 varieties of Donettes and Jumbo Donettes, is unique and requires different product and process specifications to deliver the desired flavor, appearance, texture, consistency, quality and cost,” said Darryl Riley, senior VP of quality, food safety and R&D at Hostess Brands. “Depending on the product, it may require different equipment.” Although automated options with increased flexibility are hitting the market every day, there’s another element to consider: How do you weigh which ones are worth it when it comes to the produc-

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“Developing products is truly a full-time job if you want to keep up.” Henry Lopez | plant manager | UDF Bakery

C AT E G O R Y I N S I G H T: D O N U T S

But in today’s environment, there are a lot of things driving it to be more beneficial from a cost standpoint such as the labor crisis.” Although there are plenty of challenges on all sides, that doesn’t mean R&D is slowing down. Mel-O-Cream’s team was working on several new flavors throughout the pandemic, including bringing savory and sweet together for a well-rounded and delicious bite. It took a bit of a back seat as the pandemic began, but Larson looks forward to the innovation resuming on that road. “It’s really different for this category,” Larson said, “adding more of a savory flavor into a predominately sweet type of product. That play on flavors took front and center in the donut world. As the pandemic came in, we had to be a bit more pragmatic, especially as demand at our core base business went up. But we will go back down that road. There are ideas there that are still cooking, and I think they will come together in the end.”

“Our R&D, consumer insights, marketing and manufacturing teams work closely together to identify trends and unmet needs such as flavors, inclusions and texture that we can address through innovation,” Riley said. “For example, knowing consumers are interested in new sources of energy, we recently intro-duced a caffeinated donut that’s avail-able in convenience stores nationwide.” As the world welcomes 2022 and rejoices in last year being in the rear view, only time will tell where the donut category will go. But evidence shows that this sweet good will have a place in consumers’ hearts and plenty of resources in the bakery. CB

Lopez said that UDF’s team is on that same wavelength. They are working on the sweet and savory trend as well, along with many others. They recently hired a full-time R&D employee, devoting new resources to push their flavor innovation further and gear up to take on co-packing business.

“Developing products is truly a fulltime job if you want to keep up,” Lopez said. Hostess takes a similar approach to flavor innovation, sticking to what consumers know and love about the brand, but also pushing those flavor trends that are gaining prominence.

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The Best Products Take Time

The Polish bakery NOWEL set its sights high in 2020 and, in the midst of the pandemic, invested in a line that transferred the concept of artisan bakery production into a fully automated process. International content provided by baking+biscuit international, an F2M publication. Photo courtesy of NOWEL

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I N T E R N AT I O N A L M A R K E T

BY H E LG A B A U M FA L K

Family-owned NOWEL has been producing artisan breads in Poland since 1925. It currently serves retail chains across Poland and throughout Europe, now expanding its reach as far as the US and Middle East. In this exclusive Q&A from baking + biscuit international, Helga Baumfalk sits down with the Zajezierska family to discuss the most pressing issues hitting the Polish and European markets since the onset of the pandemic.

Helga Baumfalk: NOWEL’s main products are bread rolls. In the past, you have produced more than a billion bakery products annually. Have you found that the pandemic has changed your sales channels and regional markets? Elżbieta Zajezierska: It would be difficult to identify an area of the economy that has not been affected by the pandemic. COVID-19 has redefined the existing perception of business and made several companies leave their comfort zone after years of stabilization. For us, the first wave of the pandemic last year was like a test of our procedures and readiness to make rapid and profound changes. Working closely together during the crisis situation has strengthened relationships with our business partners and improved our understanding of our common needs. Michał Zajezierski: What is important to mention, despite the experience of the last year, is that we not only maintained production, but we also did not slow down the planned investments and expansion of production lines. In just a few weeks, we have created the first consumer brand in almost a hundred

years, Home Bakery, featuring frozen and packed bakery products for home baking. It was an almost immediate response to consumer concerns, which was especially important for brands to do in the first months of the pandemic. We also invested in a new production line for premium stone-baked products. In February 2021, the products were launched in Lidl shops all over Poland with the ‘Baked on stone oven’ campaign. We were also able to open up new markets. Meetings took place from our desks, in the company office or from our home offices.

You produce bread rolls and bread with the ‘clean label’ promise and organic baked goods. Did sales in these two categories increase during 2020? Karolina Zajezierska: Currently, almost all NOWEL products carry a ‘clean label.’ In some product ranges, we have taken it a step further and also stopped using enzymes. These baked goods are based on just three to four ingredients. On the one hand, this quality is our trademark, and on the other — increasingly — our consumers expect it, not only in Poland but throughout Europe. Following these trends, each year we are increasing the number of organic products that we offer. However, we predict that despite the growing popularity of this group of products, it will remain a niche market. This is particularly due to high operational requirements in stores; retail chains must ensure there is no contamination between organic and non-organic products.

NOWEL is a manufacturer and a supplier to retailers, but it is not

well known to consumers. Did the idea of launching a consumer brand come as a result of the pandemic? Elżbieta: We have had plans for a consumer brand for some time. COVID19 has given new impetus to our efforts to launch Home Bakery. Will this product continue to be popular after the pandemic ends? Or will customers return en masse to the stores and choose fresh bread rolls straight from the oven? Time will tell! Karolina: ‘Baked on stone oven’ is our second brand that is more visible to the customer. It is the brand under which our new products are sold all over Poland and on European markets. The products are the result of several months of work and tests. Our goal was to create an original bread flavor that we remember from our childhood or from our parents’ or grandparents’ generation. The intense, deep flavor and longer freshness of the baked goods result from a precisely determined maturing time and a multi-stage fermentation process. The products owe their crunchiness, golden-brown crust and rustic character to baking on granite volcanic stone from the Italian region of Val D’Ossola.

Up until now, you have achieved about 30% of your sales in exports to about 15 countries. Has COVID19 impacted on these figures? Karolina: We have succeeded in maintaining the export share at a similarly high level. Seven further export nations were added in the past two years. Today, we are present with our products in 22 countries. We have noticed that customers are more open to new flavors.

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I N T E R N AT I O N A L M A R K E T

Photo courtesy of NOWEL

From left: Michał Zajezierski, VP, NOWEL; Elżbieta Zajezierska, president, NOWEL; and Karolina Zajezierska, commercial director, NOWEL.

Buyers are more and more often looking for novelties and going beyond domestic suppliers, which significantly increases our export opportunities.

Does this mean you will focus even more on exports in the future? Karolina: Strengthening NOWEL’s position on key European markets and further international expansion is our long-term focus and is consistently implemented in our development strategy. Our products can already be purchased on the largest markets in Europe as well as in the US and Canada. In the coming years, we want to offer our

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latest product lines, including ‘Artisan.’ We will also work on introducing NOWEL bakery products to other European countries as well as on strengthening our position in those already acquired.

From 2013 to 2019, NOWEL invested more than EUR 60 million [$68.65 million USD] in the development and acquisition of production equipment. How much did you invest in 2020? Michał: We started with a very extensive investment plan worth EUR 22 million [$25.17 million USD], which we managed to implement despite the pandemic,

largely thanks to good organization and exemplary cooperation on the part of bakery equipment suppliers. The first project was a line dedicated to the production of tin bread, mainly rye or wheat-rye, produced on the basis of our own sourdough. We implemented this project in cooperation with WP, Newcap, JBT and Diosna. The second project is what I see as the crowning achievement of our bakery and, as far as I know, is something that is also unique on a global level. We have managed to translate the artisanal process of making bakery products into a fully automated industrial production.

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I N T E R N AT I O N A L M A R K E T

In the autumn of 2019, you opened a modern research and development center in Poland. Do you work with universities? Michał: Yes, the center is also a platform for cooperation and exchange of knowledge with academic units. Together with them, we are conducting research and technological tests based on a completely new approach to bakery product consumption. This is a topic for our next meeting, but it will be a real revolution.

Before the COVID-19 crisis, the out-of-home market was considered extremely dynamic and almost unstoppable. The pandemic changed that. What is the situation in Poland? Karolina: Indeed, during the first wave of COVID-19, after years of growth, food producers in Poland saw a slowdown of the economy. The introduced trade restrictions and the appeals to stay at home also had a significant impact on

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Photo courtesy of NOWEL

Assuming the best products take time to develop their full flavor, we designed the line so that the entire production process — from the start of wheat acid fermentation, through the maturing of the dough and further processes — takes more than 40 hours. The products, which are made on natural wheat sourdough with a long maturing time (more than 12 hours), have a deep flavor, an open texture and stay fresh for a few days after the final baking. In reference to this line, we would also like to thank our partners, namely Mecatherm, Diosna and Rademaker for working with us to develop pioneer production solutions and for the proper management of the installation process during such a difficult period.

the bakery industry, both on the domestic market and in the context of exports. Economic uncertainty, as well as a big increase in interest in home baking, presented huge challenges. Fortunately, demand returned to normal relatively quickly. However, it is worth looking at the market situation in the long term. The convenience sector had been growing very quickly before the pandemic. Polish people had fallen in love with stores that provided them with necessities and were located close to their homes. Now that consumers are accustomed to the difficult situation created by the pandemic, we may find the convenience sector is one of the growth drivers for many manufacturers. As shopping centers and supermarkets closed, small outlets and petrol stations expanded their ranges and took over parts of the basic supply, including bread. BP and Orlen also offer snacks. Although there was no scientific evidence that the coronavirus could be contracted through food, consumers were initially concerned

about buying snacks and eating them without additional heat treatment. As a result, a significant part of this segment in Poland was at a standstill. However, after a period of hard lockdown, it was reintroduced. That was met with enthusiasm because, in difficult times, customers appreciated the convenience and the possibility of eating out.

How is the Polish bakery market currently developing? Michał: In Poland, the consumption of bakery products per person has been declining for some time. However, the bake-off bread category has been gradually growing for several years. Of course, the pandemic will slow growth, but we do not expect changes in this aspect in the long term. It should also be emphasized that every year, the bakery industry in Poland is growing more and more intensively, mainly due to considerable investments in new technological solutions. As a result, the competitiveness of Polish companies

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on the international market is increasing significantly. What is more, the domestic market is becoming more saturated, which directly translates into an intense price fight. Each year, the Polish bakery market is becoming more difficult for companies, and the COVID-19 pandemic has further escalated the challenges. Photo courtesy of NOWEL

Elżbieta: The Polish market is very competitive, also in terms of interindustry sectors. It is not only the producers of bakery products that fight for customers. The younger generation is not consuming bakery products as frequently, but choosing substitute products. A traditional breakfast, which would always be accompanied with a slice of bread or a fresh bread roll, often looks very different today. We are dealing with rapid growth in the sector of quick snacks and ready meals. Customers are also paying more attention to the variety of flavors and quality.

What are the main problems facing Polish bakery producers at the moment? Elżbieta: The main challenge faced by food producers is the rising production cost. Climate change directly affects, for example, the costs of raw materials and energy prices are also rising. Companies are also paying more attention to sustainable development, including elimination of greenhouse gas emissions and reduction of waste. These actions are inevitable and urgently required to save the planet but are associated with higher production costs.

Commercial Baking has developed a cooperative agreement with the leading European / international baking journal baking+biscuit international from the publishing house F2M. This magazine is the English-language sister to the acclaimed German language journal b rot+backwaren and is published six times per year with 5,000 hard copies delivered per issue and thousands reading the editions digitally.

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BUSINESS INTEL

Making a Match For emerging bakery brands, compatibility is key in seeking the right investors. BY TH O MAS MALEN GO, B R AN DJ ECTO RY

The baked goods segment of CPG has been attractive to investors over the past few years, including legacy acquisitions. From an investor or acquirer perspective, these companies have the capabilities to deliver ingredient mix (grain/gluten-free, nut-free, allergenfree, dairy-free, etc.); on the shelf or frozen; decadent; nostalgic or nutritional products to a diverse consumer set. That offers the investor or acquirer several lines of vision as to how the brand can grow, be successful and bring to the investor a healthy return on their investment. The first step for emerging brands and small businesses to attract investors is establishing strong business fundamentals. While there are many strategies that will indicate a founder has established such practices — from managing costs and operations to managing people and marketing — managing cash flow and having a weekly analysis meeting with your team and/or advisors is essential. Cash flow is, of course, a critically important factor. Reviewing cash flow on a weekly basis provides the opportunity to investigate those key indicators to keep your business solvent and growing: revenue growth, cost margins and cash runway. This gives an indication of how long the current cash in the bank will last at the weekly cash burn rate, indicating when additional funds will be needed. Additional funding into the business could be needed before this point, to fund and support new distribution, increase capacity or develop new products to stay competitive. So, when it comes to finding investors, the rule is to start now. Depending on the size and type of the

company and investment, this could take many, many months. Do online research of trade publications and news sources to find those investors interested in your segment. Network with other brands and co-founders, as well as third-party providers like distributors and co-packers, to get names of possible investors. For smaller companies, local angel groups and grant foundations may be available, though these can be overly bureaucratic and slow. There are many organizations and people that offer long lists of possible investors. Many of these can be discovered on LinkedIn and other online providers. Be mindful that these lists are very often not scrubbed or targeted, so they can be cumbersome and time-consuming to use, with little reward. Ideally, your best contact is always a referral, so the bottom line is to network. Finding the right investment partner is like finding any other partner in business and life: seek compatibility, agreement on long-term goals, and an environment of open, honest and thoughtful communication. The earliest investors from friendsand-family rounds, crowdfunding or angel investors will likely not provide much expertise or support to the business. As the business grows and investment stages and sizes become larger, and the investors become more sophisticated, they will seek more involvement and control. While these investors will perform a detailed due diligence on your business, a founder should also perform due diligence on the investor; this is,

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BUSINESS INTEL

“While an investor may have the funds, there is a difference in the value the investor brings if their capital also includes specific business knowledge or experience that can help grow the business.”

after all, a two-way street and a partnership. Ask for references, research their portfolio, and find out more about their involvement with other investments. Ask others important questions, like how the investor has interacted in good times, and how they were in bad times.

analyze the business pro forma to determine what they expect to happen in the coming years, and then present terms. In many cases, those investors and firms have strict guidelines as to the offers and risk they will take on, so they will not be open to a great deal of negotiation. The amount of risk they see will also determine the amount of involvement, control and oversight they expect.

All businesses run into issues from time to time, so you will want investors who can help problem-solve and find solutions. Understand what contacts an investor brings to the business, such as buyers, distributors, co-manufacturers or even next-stage investors.

Raising capital is a full-time job, on top of the full-time job of running a young, growing company. Finding the right investor, and the right investment, takes time. Start early with making contacts and keep potential investors up-to-date on your achievements to build important relationships. Watch your cash flow to know the lead time you have for your current cash position. Remember, most businesses fail, not because of a bad product or poor management, but because they run out of money. It is important to always think about the next round and making contacts that will help you raise capital across the various stages of growth. CB

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, assess what type of business skills, knowledge or experience they will bring to the business as a resource. While an investor may have the funds, there is a difference in the value the investor brings if their capital also includes specific business knowledge or experience that can help grow the business. In early investment rounds, the founder generally has some ability to negotiate terms because a founder is usually securing multiple small investors to fill an equity round or convertible note offering. These investors are less sophisticated, will be less involved and make their decision with less technical analysis.

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In larger and later rounds, even the most successful business has less negotiating power. Larger, more sophisticated investors will rely heavily on the technical analysis to determine valuation and terms that will provide a return on investment. They will intensely

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Solutions Automatic Bagging for Bagels and English Muffins Formost Fuji presents its automatic bagging system for bagels and English muffins, which can bag product in a penny-pack configuration. The infeed system consists of a metering conveyor, grouper and drop chute, prior to stacking the product into a bucket infeed conveyor and gently carrying it into a bag with specially designed paddles. The system is carefully engineered for a trouble-free operation, and the bag opening system provides greater irregularity tolerance. www.formostfuji.com

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SUPPLIER SOLUTIONS

Product Consistency with Reduced Footprint Reading Bakery Systems introduces its multi-pass environmentally controlled proofer to accelerate dough development time in a smaller footprint. The proofer allows for control of heat and humidity with an intuitive PLC and is optimized by a full enclosure around the machine for efficiency, maintenance and cleaning. www.readingbakery.com

Versatile Dough Dividing with Gentle Scaling Reiser’s Vemag HP-R Series dough divider with an Allen-Bradley control system provides the latest PLC technology and machine communication. Designed for bakery applications with a newly engineered product infeed system, updated doublescrew portioning technology and a user-friendly touchscreen, the machine handles and scales product more gently and precisely. www.reiser.com

Two Ways to Reduce Costly Gluten Needs Corbion offers two additions to its Pristine line: Pristine 2200 and Pristine 100 G. Pristine 2200 is a conditioning system replacement that enhances mixing and machinability, giving consistent product quality and greater tolerance and strength. The 100 G solution can be applied on top of existing conditioning systems to reduce supplementation with vital wheat gluten without compromising gas retention. www.corbion.com/bakery

Jet Pulse Filtration Capway Automation presents its new Depanner External Fine Particulate (DEFP) Jet-Pulse filter system, eliminating flour dust and other light particulates not removed by a standard Cyclone separator. The DEFP is designed for vacuum operations, and the reverse jet pulse blast removes particulates from the filters. It can be seamlessly integrated with the Capway depanning system. www.capwayautomation.com

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Clean Label Mold Inhibitor J&K Ingredients offers its new clean label mold inhibitor SOR-Mate. It serves as an effective alternative to chemical preservatives such as sorbic acid or potassium sorbate. The innovation can keep baked goods mold-free while maintaining their quality without the need for artificial preservatives. www.jkingredients.com

Flexible Case Packing BluePrint Automation’s Gantry 300 Swing case packer, a topand side-load solution, picks and loads product standing up or laying down on the same machine. The “swing” can case pack into RSC or retail-ready cases, trays and other containers. With quick changeover between recipes, it can run pouches, bags, cartons and more. www.blueprintautomation.com

Environmentally Friendly Spraying Unifiller’s Uni-Sprayer solution is designed to eliminate costly single-use individual aerosol canisters and provide a more environmentally friendly option. The machine — which can spray oil and more — is sanitary, compact and easy to clean, allowing for the spraying and flocking of a variety of products. Applications include pan release oil, egg wash, milk, simple syrups, jams, fillings, sauces and more. www.unifiller.com

Maintain Product Freshness with Enzymes LeSaffre presents an enzyme-based alternative to MDGs, giving commercial bakers a label-friendly alternative that maintains softness and freshness in pan bread and buns. The enzymes are able to outperform MDGs to extend fresh-baked, short-term softness at a lower usage level. www.lesaffre.com

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Cut Compressed Air Costs RexFab offers its fully electric Pan Stacker-Unstacker, eliminating the need for costly compressed air. The system uses a combination of servo-motor technology, in-house developed electromagnets and controllers to deliver accurate and gentle stacking and unstacking. It accommodates bread and bun pans of varying sizes, and it can stack and unstack pans open-side-up or openside-down. www.rexfab.com

Homogenize Medium- to High-Viscosity Substances ROSS’ Triple Shaft Mixers with SLIM technology offer mixing applications for slurries, pastes, gels, creams and suspensions of medium to high viscosity. They’re designed for full vacuum operation and include a three-wind anchor agitator and Teflon blades. www.mixers.com

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SUPPLIER SOLUTIONS

Small and Mid-Range Dividers Handtmann brings flexibility to small and mid-range bakeries with its new dividers, improving efficiency with targeted capabilities to address bakery-specific requirements. The advanced editions of the VF 600 PLUS series and new VF 800 and VF 800 Scalable Dividers have a short feed system with gentle vane cell handling for product quality, portion accuracy and integrated process monitoring that simplifies operations. www.handtmann.us

Gluten Protein Reduction through Enzymes REPCO’s enzyme technology XPRO effectively replaces large quantities of gluten protein. A technique that has been used for more than a decade by international flour millers, REPCO is now making the technique available to US bakers. The enzymes also upgrade other components of flour to effectively replace spring wheat with lower-cost options. www.repcoworld.com/xpro

Accurate All-Purpose Metering Feeder Brabender’s FlexWall Plus loss-in-weight feeder is an effective all-purpose metering feeder solution suitable for nearly every type of bulk material. It ensures consistent screw fill levels and proper mass flow thanks to its paddle-massaged flexible hopper. The patented trapezoidal shape positions bulk material at the optimum flow angle to feed the screw and performs well in continuous or batching applications. www.brabenderti.com

Sanitary Flowwrapping Cavanna introduces its new and improved flowwrapping systems with enhanced sanitary design. The new edition allows better and quicker cleaning of the distribution system through the exit of the flow wrapping machine, allowing for complete toolless disassembly of the entire system in preparation for cleaning using Poka-Yoke principles. www.cavanna-usa.com

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Precision Topping with Simplified Design Axis Automation’s Apex Series Topper offers industry-leading consistency and precision with an easy-to-use design. It comes in five standard widths available with faster lead times. The innovation is designed to last through the challenges of today’s baking and snack industries through a flexible architecture that can be adapted to handle different topping applications quickly and inexpensively. www.axisautomation.com

Double Arm Mixer Peerless has released its Pioneer Double Arm mixer, an expansion to its industry-leading small mixers. The newest entry into this class of dough and cream mixing is designed with bakers in mind, combining compact, stainless-steel construction with a direct-drive motor. It is engineered to take baking operations of all kinds to the next level. www.peerlessfood.com

Watch BPA’s Watch BPA’s TechTalk TechTalk E s E s B h 1413 B h 1413

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Commercial Baking Channel On-demand content to help you keep up to date with all the baking industry has to offer TechTalks Dialogue with leading suppliers on emerging technologies QuickTakes Bite-sized, behind-the-scenes interview clips Insights | Interviews Dynamic content from our travels out in the industry Podcasts Troubleshooting Innovation series with industry experts Supplier Videos Contributed content that showcases innovative solutions

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COMMERCIAL BAKING CHANNEL

Commercial Baking Channel Our multimedia collection is full of videos, podcast episodes and more, where you can get a deep look — and listen — into the exciting shifts happening in the baking industry.

TechTalk with Scott Houtz, Air Management Proper air quality is critical to a bakery manufacturing, not only for employees’ comfort and safety but also for food safety as well. Scott Houtz, president of Air Management Technologies, discusses how effective air management can improve the overall operation. www.airmanagement.com

TechTalk with Craig Souser, JLS Automation JLS Automation’s mixed-reality technology, JLS View, is helping bakers address critical training and education needs. Hear Craig Souser, p resident of JLS Automation, outline how the technology works with all the company’s offerings. www.jlsautomation.com

TechTalk with Cesar Zelaya, Handtmann Handtmann’s VF800 series divider is the company’s fifth generation of vacuum fillers using vane cell technology. Cesar Zelaya, bakery technology manager, explains how this solution, which launched in 2021, provides maximum portioning accuracy and gentle product handling. www.handtmann.us

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COMMERCIAL BAKING

COMMERCIAL BAKING CHANNEL

Behind the scenes at Companion Baking Take a peek at the Commercial Baking team’s visit to Companion Baking, this issue’s featured bakery.

How IBIE’s show floor is place for innovation and education Josh Allen, founder of St. Louis-based Companion Baking, discusses his strategies for navigating the show floor and how the Expo can be a unique training tool for novice bakers.

A retailer’s perspective on clean label David Ball, president of Ball’s Foods, discusses what label-conscious consumers expect when shopping at Hen House, a Kansas City, KS-based supermarket banner owned by Ball’s Foods.

IBIE 2022 Trailer As the global grain-based food industry’s most important trade event in the Western Hemisphere, the International Baking Industry Exposition is an invaluable experience. Check out how what’s in store at the Expo. www.bakingexpo.com

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ICYMI: The original season of Troubleshooting Innovation Season 3 of Commercial Baking’s podcast, Troubleshooting Innovation, is set to launch next month. Until then, revisit how it all began, with this binge-worthy original season with cookie and cracker production expert, Dave Van Laar.

IT ALL STARTS WITH STORAGE

1-800-558-2945 IMPERIALIND.COM SALESINFO@IMPERIALIND.COM

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COMMERCIAL BAKING

SUBSCRIBE Fresh insights on trends and innovations

Ad Index The following advertisers appear in this issue. We encourage readers to reach out to these companies through the listed website or email for further information. This index is provided as a service to readers and advertisers, but Commercial Baking does not assume any liability for errors or omissions. Please send any updates or corrections to info@avantfoodmedia.com.

AB Mauri

American Bakers Association

Brolite

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Capway Automation

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Cavanna Group

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Digital editions Website Newsletters Multimedia

Babbco

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AD INDEX

Gemini Bakery Equipment

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IBIE

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Rademaker

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Reading Bakery Systems

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Rexfab

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Shaffer

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Kaak

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J&K Ingredients

PMMI

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IPCO

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COMMERCIAL BAKING

THE LAST WORD F R O M E L I Z A B E T H AV E R Y

A Fond Farewell I am grateful to Commercial Baking for inviting me to share a few thoughts to close out this issue as it coincides with my approaching retirement after a fulfilling, challenging and, often, fun career working for and on behalf of the food industry. While it’s not my “last” word, indulge me as I share a few personal and professional observations from three and half decades advocating for an industry I love. people from 35 to 42 million, many of whom are children. We must now focus on relieving hunger with nutritious food so that everyone has a baseline of good health.

Grit and perseverance are just as important as creativity. I have invested a lot into innovation, but over time I have found that the winning organizations are those that reward the employees with stamina and ‘stick-to-it-ness.” Success often comes from those who think beyond the great next idea, trudge through the tall weeds, solve problems and regroup when things go off track, and still deliver.

Diversity drives results. I am proud of our concerted effort to bring new voices into the industry and elevate those who may not have been previously heard. The 2018 launch of WinS (Women in Snacks) focused on giving female leaders a platform to share their unique perspective, which in turn drove a deeper conversation about creating an inclusive culture so all individuals regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation are set up for success.

The pendulum always swings back. Public policy issues with serious societal concern almost always “come back.” I started out in 1986 when the nightly news obsessively tracked the progress of the lonely “Islip garbage barge” that could not find a place to offload its cargo. Images of overflowing landfills took hold, and for 12 years, my work was focused exclusively on helping companies and municipalities manage packaging and increase recycling, largely in response to this catalyst. As opportunities to recycle packaging grew, the issue receded. But the pendulum has now swung back. This time, I’m heartened to see how seriously packaging companies and their customers are working toward increasing the recyclability of hard-to-manage materials.

There is no such thing as a “work friend.” True friendships can be made under any circumstances, and I have made some of my very best friends on the job, across the eight organizations I have worked for since 1986. They don’t get an adjective in front of their designation, and their friendship doesn’t expire when I change jobs, move 3,000 miles away … or even retire. CB — Elizabeth Avery will retire as president and CEO of SNAC International in April 2022. Over three decades, she has held senior management positions with PepsiCo; ConAgra Foods; Grocery Manufacturers of America; Snack Food Association; California Building Industry Association; American Forest & Paper Association; and Keep America Beautiful, Inc.

Nutrition insecurity, not food insecurity. The snack industry has been a strong partner to national and local organizations working to eliminate hunger, also known as food insecurity, in America. The USDA is now reporting that the pandemic has increased the number of food insecure

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Commercial Baking February | Q1 2022

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