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New building for the Geier bakery
“We pulled it off ” July 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, the Geier bakery moves into its newly-built production in Strasshof, located about 10km east of the Austrian capital Vienna. Everything is right on schedule. The technology is state-of-the-art, and the focus on manual labor remains the same.
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You can guess how much organizational talent and emphasizes Gerald Geier. The bakery roasts seeds in its own enthusiasm must have gone into the move under roaster-cooker. In general, the bakery attaches great imporpandemic conditions. “We pulled it off,” says tance to its cooking and pre-doughs for whole-grain Gerald Geier, who runs the company together breads as well as grain and wheat baked goods. with his wife Erika Geier-Tschernig. Eleven To allow the sponge doughs to rest undismonths were spent building, one month turbed, a 20m2 climate-controlled room was installed in the new building. Space is was scheduled to test and optimize operalso needed for dough that requires longations, and another month served as a time proofing. Geier works with fermenbuffer. The family-owned bakery took tation times of up to 14 or 18 hours, with the planning for the new building largely flat temperature curves up to 18°C. into their own hands, supported by the The company owner suggests that the new regional planning office. E BÄ CK building is currently the most modern A short-lived stop occurred during the first ER EI artisan bakery in Austria. The focus is on lockdown in March, when the installation The company owners: Gerald Geier handwork, which is crucial for quality. of the new machines and ovens was immiand Erika Geier-Tschernig “Our complete bread assortment is worked nent and the entry regulations to Austria up by hand, predominantly, as well as the bread rolls. We work were unclear. Reports Geier, “We worked largely with a with very soft doughs, which are difficult to be processed by German oven manufacturer and were able to solve the machines.’ problem through special permits.” The main reason for investing in new technology was to reduce heavy physical work for the 64 employees in production. More space for dough handling 2 Therefore, fully automatic tilting lifters and oven loaders Spread over 4,500m , the new bakery offers significantly more space than the old one. “We put a lot of effort into the were added. Rather unusual for a craft business is the use of run-up to dough production and in dough proofing,” the new RFID* bowl recognition system with WINBACK. GE
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* Radio-Frequency Identification
www.bakingbiscuit.com 02/2021
