Milling & Baking News - September 27, 2016 - 10

Business X

Bantam Bagels busts out nationally
into Starbucks, grocery stores
NEW YORK - Bantam Bagels began
in one retail space in Manhattan's West
Village in New York. Now, the bitesized bagel balls stuffed with cream
cheese are sold in more than 7,000
company-owned Starbucks across the
nation. In October, the number of grocery stores selling Bantam Bagels in the
frozen food aisles should surpass 600.
Such growth has brought production demands. A bakery in Brooklyn,
N.Y., manufactures Bantam Bagels on a
contract basis that requires two 8-hour
shifts working five days a week, said
Nick Oleksak, who founded Bantam
Bagels with his wife, Elyse Oleksak.
Bantam Bagels' growth has led to the
creation of 40 new jobs in Brooklyn
over the past six months, he said.
"We've been working with Starbucks now for a little over a year," Mr.
Oleksak said. "So our extension with
them has been of the phased variety,
which has kind of helped us manage
our production growth on our side.
They've definitely become a real partner of ours in allowing us to have a
more phased roll-out."
The partnership with Starbucks began with three stores in Manhattan.
The number of Starbucks stores offering Bantam Bagels rose to 32, then 400,
then about 1,600 and now more than
7,800 company-owned stores, he said.
"Basically every single companyowned Starbucks store (in the United
States)," Ms. Oleksak said.
Starting in October, frozen boxes of
Bantam Bagels will be found in more
than 600 grocery stores. Kroger stores in
Ohio and Michigan will carry the items
as will QFC and Fred Meyer stores in
the Pacific Northwest; Safeway stores

in California, the Pacific Northwest and
Hawaii; and a number of independent
grocery stores in New York, Connecticut
and New England.
"For us, it's a slower growth, but it's
a more strategic growth," Mr. Oleksak
said of the frozen food aisle. "We want

Lori Greiner (center) from the TV show "Shark Tank" invested in Bantam Bagels, owned
by Elyse (left) and Nick (right) Oleksak.

to be able to partner with the right retailers and the companies that are going to
work with us to spread our story and to
sell the product in the right way."
The goal is to bring incremental revenue growth to retail frozen food, a
category in need of such growth.
"We're bringing a product that is innovative and different and allows the
customers to re-introduce themselves
to the bagel," Mr. Oleksak said.
For e-commerce, a new web site that
includes a flat rate shipping model
allows customers to have the bagels
shipped to their home.
Nick and Elyse Oleksak met while
students at Columbia University in

Prairie Flour Mills to double
milling capacity in Canada
ELIE, MAN. - Prairie Flour Mills
Ltd. has initiated a C$18 million ($13.6
million) expansion of its mill in Elie,
a move that will double production
capacity at the mill to 8,000 cwts from
4,000 cwts over the next 18 months.
The project reflects the growing demand for the company's conventional
and organic flour products, Prairie
Flour said.
"Our customer demand has been
consistently equaling and in some cases, exceeding our production capacity,
10 / September 27, 2016 XMilling & Baking News

New York. After graduating, they both
had jobs on Wall Street. Elyse worked
for Morgan Stanley. Nick was a broker.
"Both of us were looking for something that had a little bit of spark and
passion," Ms. Oleksak said. "The Wall
Street background has certainly helped
(in running Bantam Bagels). All of our
office experience, business experience,
financial experience was key to our
success, a key foundation, but we were

and a decision was made to expand
our mill," said Clayton Manness, president of Prairie Flour Mills Ltd., which
is an independent wheat flour mill.
"The growing demand for specialty
flours both conventional and organic,
coupled with our physical location in
sourcing high quality spring and winter wheats, has allowed Prairie Flour
Mills to offer quality flours at competitive prices for the baking and the food
manufacturing industry."
Construction is under way in Elie,

ready to go off and do our own thing
and feel passionate about it."
A year after the first shop opened,
Oprah Winfrey featured Bantam Bagels on her Oprah's Favorite Things
2014 list. The following January Bantam Bagels appeared on the TV show
"Shark Tank." Lori Greiner, an inventor
of retail products who has 120 U.S. and
international patents, offered the company $275,000 in exchange for 25% equity. Mr. Oleksak said they still talk to
Ms. Greiner at least once a week.
"She's a great sounding board for
basically anything you need to know
or you need to understand with your
business," he said. MBN
and a target project completion is for
early 2018.
"We are encouraged by our success
to date as a successful milling company, in a highly competitive milling industry," said Kulwinder Sandhu, general manager of Prairie Flour Mills.
"We will continue to work hard as
we go forward in offering products to
meet the changing demand for flourbased products in the future."
Founded in 1998, Prairie Flour Mills
has undergone two expansions in the
past 18 years. The mill has daily wheat
flour capacity of 4,000 cwts and storage of 50,000 bus, according to the
Grain & Milling Annual 2016. MBN
bakingbusiness.com / world-grain.com

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Milling & Baking News - September 27, 2016

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