Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | S | Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery

Edel Veit: Backerhaus Veit Ltd. offers a breath of fresh air to the baking industry with more than 80 innovative varieties of artisan bread and is as strong and steadfast as the edelweiss dotting Germany's snow-capped Alps.

Article Excerpt
Germany is renown for its Old World artistry, such as handcrafted cuckoo clocks, hearty beers and thick, salt-covered brezels. Now, artisan breads are claiming a place among such German favorites as the Bavarian oom-pah and Christkindlmarkt, courtesy of Backerhaus Veit Ltd.

Deeply rooted in German tradition, Backerhaus Veit takes the best of artisan baking and combines it with some of the latest in modern technology. In fact, its Woodbridge, Ont.-based plant houses three automated bread make-up lines and a hand-crafted line that par-bakes traditional bread, artisan flatbread, rolls, brezels and baguettes.

In many ways, it's taking a "bitte" of the Old World and bringing it to consumers throughout North America.

"Our breads are a race mix between the European and the more hard crusted sort of bread," explains Sabine Veit, president and CEO who founded the Canadian family-owned company.

Veit has found the Chicago marketplace to be accepting of artisan bread, due to its largely populated ethnic communities. In addition, the company has a large presence in retail supermarket chains throughout the country, featuring its product in in-store bakeries and under private-label brands.

"We have found that diverse marketplaces that have many consumers with a European background would rather have an Old World-style bread," she adds. "That's what people eat in Europe. Over the last year, the best-selling product has been the sliced multigrain Panini bread, which is heavy on grains and seeds."

As Backerhaus Veit experiences growing success with its artisan bread products, it has expressed a desire to move beyond its in-store bakery and private-label ventures. The company will be unveiling its own brand name, Backerhaus Veit, later this month.

Knead for Change

Like many intermediate wholesale bakers, Backerhaus Veit started in North America in 1987 with only a 7,000-sq.-ft. facility and three retail shops specialized in selling freshly baked goods. Overwhelmed by the demand for her traditional breads and rolls, Veit decided to uproot in 1991 and move to the wholesale side of the business.

Today, the bakery fills a 32,000-sq.-ft. facility in Woodbridge, Ont., and bakes more than 80 varieties of artisan bread. Veit decided to venture into the par-baked format due to its ability to provide much-needed flexibility while avoiding the peaks and valleys that many bakers experience. In addition, this gave Veit the opportunity to expand the company's distribution to the entire North American continent and beyond.

"I was [producing] one-third of the volume at the beginning of the week and two-thirds toward the end of the week," Veit recalls, "but was kind of overrun by the business. I decided I needed a shelf life for our products and researched the frozen end of it."

As such, the company moved to a larger facility in order to create...

View this article FREE - Now for a Limited Time, try Goliath Business News
Free for 3 Days!