Baking & Snack - February 2008 - 10

EDITORIAL

Break Out
ow hold on. Don't get all funky and start singing the Swing Out
Sister tune from the late 1980s. I am talking about the potential
to have a breakout year; a new beginning; an out-of-the-box year
for your company. Consumers are ready. They have geared up
during the post-Atkins years, opening their minds and wallets to healthy
eating and the goodness of whole grains. They are not afraid of trying new and exotic ﬂavors and textures in baked foods. "Natural" and
"organic" no longer conjure up images of tree-huggers from California
or naturalist Euell Gibbins declaring during an early 1970s commercial
for Post Grape Nuts cereal, "Its naturally sweet taste reminds me of wild
hickory nuts."
Trans fats have mostly been resolved by the industry, and consumers
can't get enough of omega-3s, ancient grains and healthy, portioned-controlled snacks. Vast numbers have succumbed to rationing themselves with
100-Cal packs and being satisﬁed with that instead of stopping only when
the Oreo package was empty, or the milk ran out. Whether it is the baby
boomers arriving at retirement age with the desire to prolong life or the
natural cycle of society, baked foods are once again viewed as having "the
right stuff."
Could this be the year your bakery breaks out of the status quo? While
many companies had a very good 2007, and prospects of a 2008 repeat look
equally promising, competition and commodity prices along with political
changes and pending regulations could make this year a challenge.
No successful bakery sits on its laurels. Don't lose the momentum of
2007 and the IBIE trade show with its noted innovations by equipment
and ingredient suppliers, and the potential for new products, markets and
demographics. Take a serious look at our 15th annual Capital Spending
feature (page 45) and follow, or better yet, lead the trends in automation,
efﬁciency and ﬂexibility.
See also the cover feature on Manischewitz (page 26), a successful
company that after 120 in business still continually reinvents itself based
on trends and the growing consumer realization that kosher is not just
"Jewish food."
Throughout this year, Baking & Snack is also reinventing itself. Our
pages will be ﬁlled with trends, technologies, company proﬁles and special
features that shatter the status quo. We will bring up new ideas and explore
the baking enterprise like you have never seen before. The magazine's new
look is more reader friendly, allowing you to peruse the information in each
issue in a logical fashion or jump directly to critical topics or sections that
are "must reads" for your job function.
This year, break out and give us your feedback. Baking & Snack is engrained within the
industry, not just an observer of it. And if you
haven't spent time at www.bakingbusiness.com
you're missing the mother lode. Come on and
break out! (Yeah, I saw your head nodding to
the beat.)
- Steve Berne, editor
sberne@sosland.com

BAKING & SNACK / February 2008

EDITORIAL STAFF
Executive Editor
Laurie Gorton
lgorton@sosland.com
Editor

Steve Berne
sberne@sosland.com

Managing Editor

Holly Bradley
hbradley@sosland.com

Associate Editor

Jennifer Barnett Fox
jfox@sosland.com

Associate Editor

Kimberlie Clyma
kclyma@sosland.com

Senior Editor

Shane Whitaker
swhitaker@sosland.com

Contributing Editors:

Columnists:

Donna Berry
Rebeca López-García
Richard F. Stier
Jim Kline
jkline@theensolgroup.com
Theresa Cogswell
bakercogs@sbcglobal.net
Anne Giesecke, Ph. D.
info@a-dpolicyanalysis.com

DESIGN STAFF
Design Services Manager

Sadowna Conarroe

Designer

Jennifer Cheek

Manager of Advertising Design
Classiﬁed Ad Layout

Becky White

Christina Sullivan

Design Team Assistant

Steve Piatt

PUBLISHING STAFF
Chairman
Charles S. Sosland
Vice-chairman
L. Joshua Sosland
President
Mark Sabo
Publishing Director
G. Michael Gude
Publisher
Paul Lattan
Vice-President,
Chief Financial Ofﬁcer
Melanie Hepperly
Audience Development Director Don Keating
Advertising Manager
Nora Wages
Ad Materials Coordinator
Debbie Maniez
Digital Systems Analyst
Marj Potts
Circulation Manager
Sheryl Morrow
Marketing Communications
Manager / Reprint Manager
Carrie Fluegge
Editorial and Midwest Sales Ofﬁce
4800 Main St., Suite 100, Kansas City, MO 64112
Phone: (816) 756-1000; Fax: (816) 756-0494
E-mail: BakingSnack@sosland.com
Internet: http://www.bakingbusiness.com

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Newsletter
NUSINESS
BAKING & SNACK is distributed free-of-charge to
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baking and snack food industries. SUBSCRIPTIONS: To
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$36 per year. Other Canadian and foreign subscriptions
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are accepted at $72 per year. BAKING & SNACK assumes
no responsibility for the validity of claims in items
reported. ©2008 Sosland Publishing Co. , a division of
Sosland Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the whole or any part of the contents without
written permission is prohibited. Printed in U.S.A.

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Baking & Snack - February 2008

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