This summer, her company completed an expansion that doubled plant size and more than quadrupled its capacity. Now, more than I million rolls a day flow through the 57,000-sq-ft bakery, baked to order and distributed to frozen grocery cases in 28 states. But the expansion did more than build productivity with automation, it actually improved the frozen baked foods, giving them back some of their original product moline characteristics.
Rising demand can lift a business to new heights or drown it in a sea of unmet expections. This entrepreneurial Company is succeeding by staying faithful to high product standards. Adapting automated methods to retain the hand-made touch allows Sister Schuberet’s Homemade Rolls to produce appealing, traditional, home-style baked foods without altering formula or finished product.
My biggest Concern is maintaining the quality and consistency of each product," Ms. Schubert-Barnes said. "if we are sucessful at that, we will continue to grow.
GROWTH STORY And grow it has. In 1989, Ms. Schubert-Barnes operated a catering business out of her antebellurn home in Troy, Ala. She volunteered to donate some of her signature rolls to a holiday frozen food fair at her church. Eighty orders were logged that year. But the next year, she had to cut off requests at 200 pans. And in 1991, she baked 300 orders of rolls for the event.
Demand quickly overflowed capacity. Next she moved into a 1,000-sq-ft back room at her family's furniture warehouse, but within a month she doubled the space. That brought production from 96 cases per week up to 2,600 cases.
