The past year has provided several key indicators that fresh bread products, including packaged bread, bagels, and English muffins, are gaining new levels of consumer interest.
Despite pockets of growth at individual companies, the categories spanning fresh bread, including bread, buns and rolls, bagels and English muffins, continue to remain relatively flat.
Responding to consumer demand for more gluten-free and allergy-friendly options that taste great, Little Northern Bakehouse, a Canadian company in gluten-free and plant-based breads and bakery products, is launching three new product lines at the 2019 Natural Products Expo East (Booth #535).
Bread is the most-important category in the baking industry, but also one of the most-challenging for building appreciable growth. For the 52 weeks ending November 4, 2018, the fresh bread and rolls category grew 0.13 percent in dollar sales to $13.4 billion, per IRI, Chicago.
At first glance, it might not seem that the bread aisle has changed all that much of late. Many of the same traditional products are performing as expected.
But look closer, and you'll see sliced bread products that look remarkably like their artisan cousins. Dig deeper, and clearly organic is starting to surface with more regularity.
When Sheldon Romer opened his small bakery in Boulder, CO in 1976, he sought to offer nutritious, preservative-free breads and other baked goods to a local audience yearning for authenticity, people who were seeking a deeper connection to their food.
Bread is the largest category in the baking industry, and as such, faces continual challenges related to incremental growth. While legacy brands continue to perform well, the fresh bread, bagel and English muffin categories remained largely flat to slightly down over the past year.