Bread is booming! The popularity of bread is rising like active yeast and businesses are benefitting from it. One of mankind’s most basic and ancient concoctions has 11 million photos uploaded to Instagram using the hashtag #bread. It’s all the craze whether it’s a close-up shot of the hills and valleys of fresh focaccia bread or before and after photos of bread that jumped to life from raw dough to a beautiful crusted loaf double its previous size. Despite its beauty, popularity and delicious taste, what really makes bread a cash cow for bakeries is its simple and cheap ingredients.

Water, Flour, Salt and Yeast. Four ingredients and endless possibilities. These simple ingredients are all you need to make bread or the base to a fancier style of bread that may have inclusions like nuts or fruit. Now you can tell why this delicious baked good is a staple for bakeries all over the world. Think about it, the total cost to make 1 loaf of bread is roughly $1.10 and the average artisan bread sells at bakeries for $5.00 per loaf. Right away you can see the benefit in bread baking by taking a look at the profit margin. The only thing that could get in the way of those profits is time and energy use.

The time factor is not one to overlook. You can make great profits on your bread, but if you are spending a great portion of your day making as much bread as possible, struggling to keep up with production, think of all the profits missed. There are ways to fix this problem thankfully. Making an investment in bakery equipment can help increase production without sacrificing quality or consistency. For example, it takes time to manually divide each piece of dough used for your bread baking. However, investing in a dough divider could minimize production time immensely. Empire’s dough dividers can divide at a range of ½ an ounce to 56 ½ ounces and make 20 to 120 divisions per divide. To cut even more production, Empire’s dough divider/rounder not only divides the dough but mechanically rounds the dough for you as well. If your bakery produces French baguettes, then Empire’s French Bread Moulder is just what you need for increased production. This moulder is capable of producing 1,200 baguettes loaves per hour from 1.75 t- 42.3 ounces!

Another factor that could put a damper on the great profitability of bread baking is energy use. Firing up the oven frequently could run up your energy bill each month. Luckily there is a solution to this issue as well.  Empire’s electric brick bread oven uses an ECO Energy Optimization System which limits energy consumption based on need and allows bakers to use 50% less energy. Running your oven at 50% less energy use will help put money back into your pocket each month. On top of energy efficiency, the electric deck oven is capable of baking up to 150 loaves per bake, increasing overall production and saving even more time!

Artisan breads are all the craze right now, and it's proven that baking these breads is a low-cost high-reward scenario for bakers. With investments into the right equipment, your bakery could take those profits to the next level and help grow your bakery!