Bakery Showcase Spotlight: Bakers share secret recipes for resilience

When François Barrière opened the first branch of Boulangerie Toledo, in the heart of Montreal’s Plateau-Mont-Royal neighbourhood, in 2019, it was the fruit of three decades of dreams and more than five years of analysis.

“I’m a data guy,” the former banker said. “I’d planned out my first day.”

Once the doors opened, though, much of his planning went out the window. “We were four months behind schedule, and I thought, ‘It’s now or never.’ The night before, the glass shields we had between the sales floor and the production floor had all broken, so we had no shields and there was flour everywhere. The electricity wasn’t entirely hooked up, so there was equipment we couldn’t run.” He made $1,980 that first day – $20 short of his goal. “I should have been happy,” he said, but he went home and cried, wondering what he’d gotten himself into.

That was just the beginning. When he got to work on day three, he saw police tape, blood and broken glass. A complete stranger had broken in and bled out on the floor. The bakery closed for two days to bring in a post-disaster cleaning team, then kicked into high gear. Over the next year, Toledo gained a following, and its baguettes were named Montreal’s best. Barrière and his colleagues were enjoying themselves as the bakery’s first anniversary approached.

“March 13, 2020, I had champagne and balloons ready for the anniversary – and that’s when [Quebec Premier] François Legault sent everybody home.” The COVID-19 pandemic had arrived.

Three Montreal-area bakers – Barrière; Marie-Ève Chaume, cofounder of specialty bakery Viva Panettone; and Dominique Bohec, president and chief executive officer of Boulangerie Humanité – shared their stories of entrepreneurial resilience during a French-language panel at Bakery Showcase in Montreal on April 15, moderated by Élisabeth Brasseur of Farinart and the BAC board of directors.

They spoke frankly about how the past few years of public health restrictions, inflation, labour shortages, supply chain challenges, and more recently, tariff uncertainty – not to mention unforeseen circumstances – put their plans to the test.

“Those first few days [in 2019] built my resilience – I was able to say, ‘You don’t know what’s going to happen, so have a little faith in yourself,’ ” Barrière said. He drew on his previous experience with adversity to weather the COVID storm. After the initial shock of the pandemic, the bakery pivoted to online sales; once restrictions eased somewhat, they even opened a second bricks-and-mortar location.

Chaume was speaking two weeks after a fire destroyed a building near her bakery, forcing her to pause production and lay off staff. “I’m testing my resilience plan as we speak.”

She emphasized the importance of self-care before, during and after a crisis. “I’ve been in crisis mode for 15 days and I’m really tired. If I didn’t take care of myself, if I wasn’t in good physical and mental health before this happened, I wouldn’t be the same person speaking to you today. It’s also important to understand why you’re doing what you’re doing; that helps put you in a position where you can absorb the punches. I really adore my product, I love my team and I love watching my baby grow up – that’s what drives me. ”

Bohec spoke of having to deal with a wave of employee turnover, largely driven by differences of opinion about where the business was going, during a severe labour shortage. “There we were in mid-July with no one taking the orders and no accountant,” he remembered. “Then there was equipment trouble – a fire in a freezer that never would have crossed my mind. Then there were cashflow issues, and I had to negotiate with suppliers . . . and completely refinance. We actually finished that year in an excellent position, but I had a lot of trouble sleeping.”

Alongside the importance of flexibility, motivation and staying healthy, he also highlighted the importance of quality data when weathering supply shocks, inflation and evolving demand. Having quality data allowed his company to pivot to – and focus on – what they did best amid market uncertainty. “If you have data, you won’t go into panic mode.”

Toward the end of the panel, the panellists addressed global economic instability. All expected difficulties in the months ahead; Chaume even mentioned the possibility of a worldwide recession. But none of the panellists seemed panicked. Bohec explained that Boulangerie Humanité exports a quarter of its products to the U.S. “We’ve been lucky: we have very good relationships with our customers. We had some American customers who refused to do business with us because we were Canadian, but the tide is turning. A bakery is a long-term project, and then there are ups and downs. If we’re not ready to do [weather the ups and downs], I think we’re in the wrong field.”

Watch for more Bakery Showcase coverage in upcoming print editions and at bakersjournal.com and baking.ca.