Awrey’s new mini dessert line hits the sweet spot between economics, flavor and portion control.
It isn’t always easy for a 102-year-old company to shake up its product offering. But at Awrey’s Bakeries LLC, Livonia Mich., innovation is a key part of remaining viable in an increasingly competitive market. The privately owned volume baking company rolled out a line of thaw-and-serve, 2.5-oz. mini desserts at the end of June, a little less than two years after inception. The company has launched roughly 12 new products in the last two years.
“We have a group that meets every week and reviews new product opportunities for major chains,” says CEO Bob Wallace. “We do a lot of research with Technomic, and it was clear that mini desserts was a trend as people seek to lower portion sizes and portion costs.”
Fresh yet familiar
The smaller portion dessert idea was one of the first tasks to cross the desk of Erich Chieca, culinary director, national accounts, when he joined the company in July 2009. Chieca and the R&D team toyed with doing a cupcake line because the plant’s existing pans, depositors and staff would easily support production. But they ultimately decided on mini desserts after determining that they could get the line up and running with minimal capital investment on the existing muffin lines. Moreover, they agreed that the market for cupcakes had grown far too crowded.
“Other than innovative flavors and toppings, everyone has stayed within that same cupcake liner, so to speak,” Chieca says. “We wanted to come out with something fairly familiar, close to our competition but slightly different.” To encourage the ideation process, Chieca brought in samples of cupcakes and mini desserts from competitors. “We tore into their products and said, ‘What do we like, what do we dislike and what can we do better?’”
The Contemporary Collection mini dessert line comprises six varieties: carrot cake and red velvet with cream cheese icing, s’mores cake, strawberry cream cake, New York cheesecake and caramel toffee mini brownies. Chieca and the team whittled the selection down from 30 flavors that were initially floated to internal panels. That number was cut in half and then submitted to consumers for grassroots sensory testing to gauge interest.
“We developed a list of questions, took the 15 out and had people sample and rate them,” Chieca says. “Everything pushed us to the six flavors we currently have.”
Once the team had settled on the flavors, Chieca had to determine the right intensity level. Since a one-bite dessert can handle a richer flavor profile than a 4- or 6-ounce cupcake he was able to experiment. “The key element was flavor. Since we were doing a smaller portion size, I went through several iterations of varying intensity.”
Teaching a light touch
The entire Contemporary Collection line is produced in Awrey’s Noblesville, Ind., facility. The plant once housed Atkins Elegant Desserts, known for fully baked frozen cheesecakes and layer cakes. Awrey’s purchased the company in June 2009. Noblesville is the more “hands on” of the company’s two plants; Awrey’s flagship Livonia, Mich., plant is almost entirely automated.
The Noblesville location churns out about 6,000 mini desserts per hour on the front end, while the finishing line produces about half that. An eight-hour shift typically yields 400 to 500 cases of product (with 24 units per case). Four to five employees work on initial mix and production, with 10 finishing the products by hand. Some formulas, like the cheesecake, are 100 percent scratch, while others, such as the strawberry cake and s’more, come from a supplier-made cake base. A bottom crust is deposited into lined tulip cups and batter is deposited on top. The products are racked and baked in rotating rack ovens, then cooled and put into cold storage. They are hand finished on the mousse line.
Chieca says that the biggest hurdle on the production end was training staff on topping and mousse application. “If you are too heavy-handed, you can fill the entire top of the cup up and it wasn’t meant to go all the way out to the wrapper. I noticed it was getting inconsistent, so we took our printed pictures and I told them this is what they need to look like. Those pictures are now hanging on the line for the staff to see every day.”
Carving out a niche
Since launch, a number of regional and national supermarket and club chains have expressed interest in the mini dessert line, many of which are requesting proprietary formulas. Awrey’s business is currently about a 60:40 mix of private label to branded products. “We designed these to go under the Awrey’s brand, but we have a lot of people lined up that are looking at their own versions,” Chieca says.
Wallace adds that because Awrey’s specializes in customized solutions with quick turnaround, the company isn’t necessarily biased in favor of its branded offerings.
“I imagine with new platform we’ll have major chains wanting customized solutions,” he says. “We’ll wind up creating customized flavors. And there’s an opportunity for seasonal offerings–be it cranberry orange for the holidays or citrus for spring and summer.”
The most challenging aspect of launching a brand new product is convincing clients to expand their existing offering, though Chieca’s team did the legwork upfront to prevent overlap. “You are literally knocking on distributors’ doors, seeing if their customer base has a need. We looked at other products they’ve had success with, and since we had a point of differentiation, we weren’t cannibalizing what they were doing.”
Wallace adds that the excitement associated with an on-trend product outweighed any obstacles. “It didn’t present a hurdle; it presented an opportunity because we already have those distributors as clients. Everybody is looking for new items to create excitement. The product has broad appeal among all of our clients–foodservice distributors, in-store bakeries and foodservice chains.”
Chieca says that maintaining control over production and labor costs has helped streamline new product rollouts. “You can’t be innovative if you’re not willing to take some risks; you have to figure out what your tolerance to that risk is,” he says. “We were able to control that because the mini desserts fell into an area where we could control the production and labor costs. Unlike larger commercial operations that are focused in specific areas, our runs don’t have to be 100,000 cases at a time, which gives us a unique perspective.”
He notes that involving multiple departments early in the process was key to the product line’s quick and successful launch. “The staff needs to know where we are to make sure we have the capabilities in-house to go through with the launch, especially if it’s a market-driven new product launch like this one was,” he says. “We are relatively flat as an organization, so there aren’t a thousand gatekeepers. Our cross-functional team of R&D, purchasing, operations, finance, marketing and their teams were all instrumental in the process.”
