fastest-growing city. To keep up, the bakery relies on creative products,
high quality standards and alliances with suppliers.
IJ WHITE SPIRAL COOLING SYSTEM which feeds two packaging lines, was critical in gaining efficiency and saving valuable space in Great Bun's Bakery's 17,000-sq.-ft. plant.
His on-the-mark timing and strategies to capitalize on opportunities pulled Madonia, now 75, from retirement and propelled him into a second career. In 1982, he launched Great Buns Bakery Inc., which has become one of the fastest-growing volume wholesalers in the United States.
The bakery's location, Las Vegas, offers an obvious clue to the bakery's growth. As the nation's fastest growing city, Las Vegas has experienced a 55% burst in population since 1990. Driving that explosive growth largely has been the mushroom-like increase in the number of the city's resort hotels. During the 1990s, their presence has created jackpots of opportunities for vendors. Enter Great Buns.
Seven days a week, the bakery supplies about 100 hotels and, restaurants with hearth-baked conventional and artisan breads and rolls, bagels, muffins, croissants and Danish. Consuming nearly 125,000 lbs. flour a week, Great Buns has become the largest independently owned bakery in Nevada and the state's largest supplier of dinner rolls, Madonia says. Annual volume has surged by as much as 50% in recent years, and "there's no end in sight to this growing market," he adds.
Great Buns management has had to be quick on its feet to keep up not only with heady volume gains but also changes in customers' needs. Since the late 1980s, Las Vegas has evolved from a cowboy-like town attracting mostly western U.S. gamblers to become a cosmopolitan city, whose airport daily welcomes thousands of visitors from around the world. Hotel and restaurants' bakery needs have changed accordingly.
Great Buns meets the challenges of Las Vegas' evolving foodservice market by "taking ordinary products and making them extraordinary," Madonia says. The bakery achieves that goal by developing creative products, following high quality standards and applying automation to increase efficiency.
When opening Great Buns in 1982, Madonia and his wife, Linda, had much experience on which to draw. Since 1947, he had owned and operated Royale Rolls Bakery in Buffalo, N.Y., one of the country's first volume bakeries dedicated to supplying fast food operators, such as McDonald's and Burger King, and steakhouse restaurants in New York State.
The couple sold the business, retired and moved to Las Vegas in 1980. "After moving here, we found that no bakery offered the high quality, European-style bread and rolls we were used to in Buffalo," Madonia recalls. "Later, we realized that a market for high quality product was developing. So, after seven years of retirement, I felt it was time to go back into baking."
The Madonias bought a retail bakery, introduced their crusty bread products and sweet goods, and sold increasing amounts wholesale from the back door. By 1984, Augie had convinced his son, Tony Sr., 54, and daughter in law, Lynn, to join them in the emerging wholesale operation. Tony Sr. had worked with Augie at Royale Rolls.
The family purchased a larger facility, which after expansion, currently covers 17,000 sq. ft. Grandson Tony Jr., 33, came on board in 1990.
Large capital expenditures
Keeping pace with the increasing volume has required large capital investments in equipment and control systems. In late 1998, Great Buns completed a $3.5 million installation, including a high-speed bun line and other gear, and during the last three years spent another $400,000 in improvements. Plowing capital into the business has been key to the bakery's plan to become a "one-stop source for the hotel and restaurants' bakery needs," Augie says.
