Baking & Snack - June 2016 - (Page 36) FIREKING BAKING CO. Lessons learned in the baking business Making the jump from chef and restaurateur to wholesale baker, Greg Acerra, owner of Fireking Baking Co., found that running a bakery was not quite the same as running a restaurant. With the help of industry relationships, he's been able to learn some valuable lessons. Knitting together his hands-on education over the years, Mr. Acerra put his focus on growing the business, choosing to hire gifted individuals to handle the baking aspect of the company. "Have I taught myself to bake? No," he said. "The business has grown so fast it has been way beyond my ability to do that. I just try to hire very good people, and I work very hard at trying to hold onto the people I have." To retain valuable employees, Mr. Acerra made a commitment to paying them well, offering benefits such as a 401(k) program and health insurance. As a result, Fireking sees little turnover. As the company grew, Mr. Acerra began to expect more and more from his staff and sometimes gave the wrong duties to the wrong people. In running his restaurants, Mr. Acerra expects both artistry and number-crunching from his chef; the same, he found, is not true of his bakery. "As I grew, I made the mistake of demanding those things from the same person, and I started getting pushback from people," he said. "So I found a person who is strong in costing and percentages and let that person be responsible for that, and let the artistic people run with what they do." Mr. Acerra brought on a plant manager, Christopher Micallef, to handle production schedules and costing, allowing Fireking's baker Krzysztof Ramotowski to focus on the product development and quality. "I found it better served myself, the company and the people to separate those duties," Mr. Acerra said. recently, installed a Koenig Menes line, all at the requests of employees to help them fulfill their growing capacity needs. After that Rheon line, Mr. Acerra made the commitment to new equipment. "When you first start out, you're a scrapper," he said. "You don't have a lot of access to the capital that you need to grow the business, so you're buying used equipment and doing what you can." Now that Fireking is growing at full force, Mr. Acerra doesn't have as many challenges acquiring the capital needed to invest back into the business. "I made a personal commitment that I only want to buy new equipment from this point forward, and I want to buy the best there is," he said. "It will be expensive, but I believe [ROI] will come back fast." When Mr. Acerra made this commitment, he laid out some criteria about what he would be looking for. He wanted the best, most efficient equipment for sure, but there was more to his checklist than just that. With so many global equipment companies, it was important that he would have access to parts in the US, even if his equipment was made overseas. "Eventually you will need those parts, and you can't wait two weeks for them to come in," he said. Next-day parts availability in the US was a must for any piece of equipment he would purchase. WHAT'S YOUR SPECIALTY? AMF Bakery Systems introduces a complete line of Sigma Arm Mixers for the mixing of cookies, crackers, buttermilk biscuits, pie doughs and a variety of other specialty snacks. The sanitary frame design provides easy access maintenance combined with an innovative direct tilt system for improved safety and more efficient maintenance. Your bakery is our world. complete bakery solutions | www.amfbakery.com | 1-800-bakers-1 a markel food group company http://www.amfbakery.com Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Baking & Snack - June 2016 Baking & Snack - June 2016 Table of Contents Table of Contents Editorial - Filling in the gaps Newsfront - FDA reverses course on ‘healthy’ labeling Bimbo restructuring into new phase ABA president addresses workforce gap to B&CMA FDA updates Nutrition Facts Panel People/In Brief AIB provides open access to kill step research Dietary Guidelines - Decoding the process Dietary Guidelines: A quick history Fireking Baking Co - can't stop, won't stop Lessons learned in the baking business Fireking takes on niche Train for success and safety Frozen/Par-Baked - Living the good life Becoming the toast of the town Turning ciabatta into an artisan snack Fats, Oils, Shortenings - Changing all choices Shortening ‘mix tape’ Let’s talk organogels Clean Label - When simpler is better Case in point: dough tolerance Ingredient App - The crunch of apples R&D Perspective - It's not easy being clean Ingredient Handling - Look before you leap How to go with the flow Pretzel Technology - Tale of two textures Producing the classic pretzel Processing Flexibility - Efficiency included Adapting to brownfield Bag Closing - Reliable and simple Tech Showcase: Warehouse/Distribution - Only the beginning Sanitation Strategies - Adding up the real costs Industry Images - Technically speaking... 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