How To Start Your Own Bread Bakery Business In Nigeria
I am not a bread person. I would rather wait patiently for my “hot Amala” or invest in a nice piece of cake alongside a really cold drink.
Fortunately, most consumers aren’t like me. And that’s why bread bakery business is an ever lucrative business venture.
A report suggests that BREAD IS THE WORLD’S MOST WIDELY EATEN FOOD and that Men eat bread more frequently than women: 44% of men eat bread twice a day compared with 25% of women.
In Nigeria, it is said that up to 5 million loaves of bread are consumed in Lagos every day, without taking into account other parts of the country.
The lesson for potential investors in the bread bakery business is that there is a vibrant market for the product.
There are other profitable business ideas including commercial cleaning business, laundry business, cooking gas distribution business, farming business, and barbing salon business.
You can also consider starting a computer business center in your vicinity.
However starting your own laundry business is totally worth the while.
So, if you are wondering what business to invest your resources into, the bread bakery business is a sure bet.
Some entrepreneurs even believe it is much safer and more profitable running a bakery as compared with running a poultry farm or fish farm.
That’s a debate for another day. Let’s dive into the business of the day:
How To Start & Run A Profitable Bread Bakery Business
1) Conduct A Market Research:
If you are yet to make up your mind about starting your own bread bakery business, then you should go ahead to conduct a more detailed research to identify your Potential Customers. You should also identify other bread bakeries in your locality and evaluate their mode of operations
2) Locate a suitable site or premises:
Equally important is the location of your bakery. There are many factors to consider when siting your bakery but the most important is the cleanliness of the surrounding. This will come in handy when you apply for certification from the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control.
Other factors to consider include:
-
- Sufficient foot traffic
- Convenient car parking space
- Sufficient bake house space
- Sufficient storage space
- Retail or wholesale dispatch space
3) Qualifications:
You need to have the appropriate training in catering.
While you may be good at creating a gorgeous sourdough in your home bread bakery business, those skills won’t get you far in a commercial bakery.
The same can be said about training for commercial purpose while aiming to have a home-based bakery.
Look for a professional trainer and try out your skills by getting attached to a bakery in your vicinity.
The range of products you will produce should also determine the depth of training and courses you will take on the art of bread making.
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4) What are your options?
You have to determine the type of bakery you want to start. Your options include:
- Online Bakeries: Bakers have found a way to provide baked goods at a lesser cost. They do away with having a storefront and just do business through the Internet. What they do is obtain the necessary licenses that one usually gets when putting up a bakery, then they create a website where they can post pictures of their products and add a shopping cart service onto the website.
- Counter Service Bakeries: These are the traditional kind of bakeries wherein the staff would tend to their customers as they approach the counter. There the customers would choose the type of bread or baked goods they would like to purchase, people behind the counter wrap it up for them and then the customers pay. It’s the typical kind of bakery you see, and the great thing about it is that it provides quick service to customers. E.g. Captain Cook Bakeries located all over Nigeria
- Home Based Bakery also known as micro baking.
- Specialty Service Bakeries: Specialty service bakeries are those that specialize in certain types of baked goods. Usually, the products customers purchase from these types of bakeries are those that are pre-ordered. They describe to bakers what they want to be done, and the bakers would work on the project for a given number of days.
- Sit-Down Bakeries: A lot of bakeries nowadays are trying to attract more customers and gain more profit by letting their customers dine inside the bakeries. They provide clean seating and waiting services, as well as menus with a selection of food their customers can choose from. These bakeries are like cafes, adding coffee beverages and other refreshments, only they still would mostly specialize in baked goods. An example of such bakery is Ostrich Bakery in Osogbo.
- The combination of any of the above.
5) Determine the range of products:
There are different types of bread that you can bake. Let’s mention a few:
- Coconut Bread
- Banana Bread
- Wheat bread
- Sliced bread
- Fruit bread
- Chocolate bread
- Ghana bread
- Milk bread
- Dinner rolls
- Hamburger bread
- Italian bread
- Round sponges, etc.
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6) Get your bread bakery equipment:
It is possible to set up a bakery for as low as N100,000 or less. Meanwhile, you will have to run a lot of processes manually.
For a small-scale bakery, the following bakery equipment will come in handy:
- Locally made Oven which costs about N50,000 and can produce bread from one bag of flour per day. They are made here in Nigeria. Walk into any factory where they fabricate ovens, tell them your standard, and give them the shape of your pan and they will produce suitable one.
- Baking pans: Budget N7000 or more
- Weighing scale: N3500 or more
- Mixing bowls: N3000 or more
- Work Table
- Branded Packaging nylon
- Shelves
- Refridgerator
- Other utensils
And the basic baking ingredients such as sugar, baking yeast, baking fat, flour, Salt and water.
To set up a large-scale bakery that houses modern machinery, one will have to budget at least N2.5 million or more depending on the chosen scale of production and expertise.
For the entry level, the major equipment include:
- Industrial baking oven
- Mixing Machine
- Milling machine
- Bread slicer for selling sliced bread
- Proofing chamber: No commercial bakery is fully equipped without a proofing cabinet. As all bakers know, the dough must rise, which is best done in warm humid temperatures (usually about 37ºC and 85 % humidity for a fast rise). An essential piece of bakery equipment, a proofing cabinet allows you to control these variables for the perfect dough.
- Dough dividers
- Standby generator(s)
- Supply truck/van: You need at least one supply vehicle to aid distribution of your products.
- Bakery display case
7) Staffing:
When coming up with a range of products to manufacture, decide if you want to bake the products yourself or hire someone more talented.
It is possible to run a micro bakery alone but it is close to impossible to efficiently manage a large-scale bakery.
Employ experienced hands to manage the delicate part of the business while you can employ newbies to carry on the rest of the production process.
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8) Get NAFDAC approval:
Before you produce your first bread, ensure you have been certified by NAFDAC.
With the increase in production of unhealthy and substandard products, it is necessary to ensure that bread bakeries are up to date on best practices.
This is where NAFDAC and other regulatory bodies come in.
Moreover, your customers are much likely to purchase from you when they know you have been certified safe by the regulatory body.
It’s not easy taking on a new business venture, especially one that relies so much on the taste of the customers.
However, with the right quality control, packaging, and marketing, success is inevitable in the bread bakery business.
To learn how to market your business, visit our sales and marketing section to gain insight into up to date information. Have fun.