IBIE 2022 highlights

Las Vegas – IBIE served as a smorgasbord for baking businesses where there was plenty of substantial information to be consumed and exciting extra features to sweeten the experience. As with all buffets, there is only so much time to gobble up information, inspiration and opportunities. Here is a quick first taste with a Canadian flavour.

On Sept. 17-21, the International Baking Industry Exposition gathered members of the baking industry together at the Las Vegas Convention Center for five days of learning, connecting and celebrating an industry like no other.

Award-winning cake artist Jean Schapowal, owner of Cakes with Character, shared many tips and ideas for restructuring your cake business in challenging times. During the pandemic, Schapowal supplied cupcakes for drive-by birthday parties using individual packaging, worked with other complementary businesses in her Long Island community such as packaging suppliers, larger bakeries with more ordering power, and donated cakes to both keep herself busy and benefit others. Every one of those donations brought her repeat business, Schapowal said

Justine Martin of Guilty Pleasures Bakeshop in Sudbury, Ont., gave an energizing talk on how to set up your baking business to work smarter, not harder. This strategy includes delegating and contracting out work to free up time for Martin to travel, compete, promote her brand and do long-term planning to diversify and make the business more resilient.

Donuts with Dawn assembled an enthusiastic women’s networking session, taking a photo of approximately 200 women involved who are leaders in the baking business. Carrie Jones-Barber, CEO of Dawn Foods; Cordia Harrington, founder and CEO of Crown Bakeries and chair of the American Bakers Association; and Brittny Stephenson Ohr, director of product management for Sugar Foods Corporation and board chairman of the American Society of Baking, talked about their roads to leadership, Harrington reminding the audience that women’s equality in the workplace is being cited by several sources as the top driving force in the workplace. Other entrepreneurs were invited to take the mic, among them Pei Wu, owner and founder of Mochi Foods who announced the young company’s partnership with Dawn on its gluten-free mini-doughnuts featuring rice flour.

Cory Jong of Hey Cake This! in Vancouver, and Emerlie Ann Miller of My Sugar Rush in Salt Lake City, Utah, won two categories of the Pillsbury Cake Decorating Competition held at the Retail Bakers of America stage and education area at the centre of the north hall. The partners worked diligently in front of a riveted audience to make four cakes in two days on various themes. Their “Four Seasons” buttercream-covered cake was designed to be turned and viewed from four angles depicting spring, summer, fall and winter. Their fondant-covered depicted England’s new king through a crown mounted on a cushion that featured very realistic quilting achieved in part by using plastic wrap to simulate the puckered quilting, Miller explained.

Matthew Duffy, professor at Centennial College led a beginner’s class on making sourdough bread. Rye sourdough is a great way to start making sourdoughs because it uses a soft grain flour, requires less precision and is more forgiving than some other breads. Duffy also recommended using scalded flour for about 10-14 per cent of the overall formula. Jenna Hutchinson and Ashley Kowasan of Jenna Rae Cakes in Winnipeg demonstrated several techniques using their line of lustre dust. They created a fabric-like material by painting the dry dust on a thin sheet of glycerin using a fluffy makeup brush.

Kwik Lok displayed its sustainable enclosures, which include cardboard and printed using edible ink, and system of applying them. The company designs systems for bakeries based on what they are looking for: recyclability, reusability or compostability.

Puratos’ Artisan Marketplace was the setting for demonstrations on such topics as Nordic baking using sprouted grains and the company’s Sourdough Library.

Among new products were Richardson’s Cremin ready-to-ship vegan icing and golden croissant Danish roll-in margarine, Cargill’s Palmagility easily spreadable icings that solve the problems of brittleness and greasiness and stickiness, and ECD Bakewatch’s Cake-ometer and Bread-ometer, which use innovative sensors to give bakers data on their products that they can access on a computer and choose the lowest of several temperatures to help create a consistent bake.

Creators of B.C.’s Ta-Daa Box demonstrated for bakers an exciting way to reveal their creations with the pull of a ribbon. Apex Motion Control showcased its Baker-Bots that were busy stamping out cookies and doing other labour-intensive tasks. The bots earned the company a Best in Baking award in the automation and robotics category.

Bakers Journal will serve up more trends, product and business tips discovered at this year’s Baking Expo online, on our social media channels and in the November print edition of the magazine.