If you enjoy baking, then you have a chance to tap into a vast customer base just waiting to be offered delicious baked goodies. There are plenty of business opportunities in baking for entrepreneurs with the skills, passion, and determination to craft sweet treats.
Wondering how you can build your wealth as a food lover and pastry creator? Put your ICCA pastry certificate to good use with these baking business ideas and learn about the top five best-selling products.
Beyond a Bakery: Top Business Ideas for Bakers
When building a company around your skill and passion for baking, the first thing you must think about is the type of business you wish to pursue.
Some offer the opportunity to cater to more customers but may require higher initial capital. Others provide flexibility for you to focus on a specific niche or target market or even allow you to work in your home kitchen.
To help you choose, here are some of the best business ideas that seasoned bakers have tried:
Traditional Bakery
When choosing a business in the baking industry, the most obvious choice is to open a bakery. Traditional bakeries cater to walk-in clients and usually display various baked goods they made in their own facilities.
Home Baking
If running a bakery does not work for you, you can still put your baking skills to use and earn a profit on the side with home baking. When doing so, you can make baked products in your home kitchen and sell them to local bake shops, restaurants, and even online (more on this below).
Online Bake Shop
Websites and social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram let you sell cookies, cakes, and other baked goods from a virtual shop. These platforms are excellent for food selling online since you can share pictures of your products to your target market. After all, what better way is there to entice customers into buying than by providing mouth-watering images of your products?
You can choose to sell locally, given the limited shelf life of most baked food items. You also need to take into account the length of time for shipping to nearby areas to ensure that your products reach your customers in their best state.
5 Best-Selling Baked Products to Try
Baked goods are generally popular among the masses. But like everything else, there’s always a crowd favorite — several, in fact.
According to the 2017 Retail Bakery Operations Study in the United States, the industry has reached a point where both popular classic treats and new products play equal roles in baking businesses’ road to success. In the survey, respondents deemed the following items as the top five bakery products they produced:
- Cookies – 89 percent
- Cakes – 79 percent
- Cupcakes – 73 percent
- Muffins or scones – 68 percent
- Cinnamon rolls – 65 percent
Given this information, here are the five best-selling baked products (or variations of them) that are worth making for your baking business:
1. Cookies
Among all the baked products out there, cookies reign supreme in terms of sales and popularity. Among all types of cookies, chocolate chip is considered a staple in any family home.
Besides chocolate chip, another type of cookie is gradually becoming more popular: the macaron. Not to be confused with macaroons with two “O’s,” a macaron consists of two flat and round cookies made using almond flour put together to sandwich different emulsified fillings, like jam and ganache.
You can learn how to make this yummy product by taking macaron baking classes or following recipes available online.
2. Cakes
Following cookies as the second favorite baked product of all time are cakes.
The term, which originated from the Norse word “kaka,” describes a soft and bread-like product topped with icing and other decorative ingredients like chocolate, fruits, and candy sprinkles.
Over the years, it has become a symbol of celebration in most households. In the 19th century, cakes were considered a luxury because the ingredients like chocolate and sugar were quite expensive at the time.
Even today, cakes are always present during birthdays, weddings, and just about any kind of celebration. As modern technology paved the way for more affordable and cost-effective baking, eating cakes remains one of the people’s favorite ways to commemorate the good things in life.
3. Cupcakes
Dubbed as the small version of cakes, cupcakes take the third place among the top five most popular baked products. This is probably due to the convenience they bring in baking and eating.
Want to know something interesting? The first cupcake recipe was uncovered in a cookbook called “American Cookery by Amelia Simmons,” but the term itself was coined in the 1828 cookbook “Eliza Leslie’s Receipts.”
Cupcakes are also often mistaken for muffins, but the two are not the same (read on to learn more).
4. Muffins
Although they look alike, cupcakes and muffins aren’t the same.
Cupcakes usually have more fat (oil, dairy, or butter) and sugar in them. They also often include ingredients such as whipped eggs and are traditionally topped with frosting.
On the other hand, muffins are prepared using the “muffin method,” where the dry and wet ingredients are mixed in two separate bowls before being combined gradually. Although some cupcakes can also be prepared using this method, muffins can be distinguished by their lower sugar and higher fruit and grain contents. They also tend to be more savory compared to cupcakes and can include vegetables and cheese.
5. Cinnamon Rolls
As the name implies, this baked product comes in the form of rolled bread and a filling made primarily of cinnamon, butter, and sugar. In the US, this pastry is a staple at the breakfast table, but it can be enjoyed at any time of the day.
As a sign of its popularity, cinnamon rolls have amassed many varieties around the world. Some of the most popular ones include the sticky-sweet Philadelphia-style and the light Swedish cinnamon roll. They can also be found in gluten- or dairy-free varieties for people with diet restrictions to enjoy.
Sweetness Overload
Pastries and other baked goods are quite famous in the market today. In fact, their popularity continues to grow as more and more bakers decide to bring new twists to classic favorites, leading to an overload of sweetness in this yummy business venture. Use this article to start your baking business today.
AUTHOR BIO
Shanaaz Raja is the Course Director at International Centre for Culinary Arts – ICCA Dubai.