Baking & Snack - May 2018 - 36
MILLER BAKING CO. father's lessons in quality and service to grow the business further. Ten years after taking on Miller Baking Co., he incorporated soft pretzel buns into the daily fresh production and watched the line take over production. "We grew from 35 lb in a Hobart mixer to a couple hundred pounds to a couple thousand pounds to, 'Holy cow!' " Mr. Miller recalled. "People were calling us from other cities wanting to know if they could get the product." Then in 2010, three years after toying with the idea of soft pretzel buns, Whole Foods Midwest division approached Miller Baking Co. about selling frozen pretzel buns to the retail chain. Thus began the move from a bakery selling rolls in white bakery bags to selling a branded product. Pretzilla was born. Dedicated to Pretzilla Miller Baking Co.'s original building on 5th Street in downtown Milwaukee is 12,500 sq ft. In that facility, the bakery made all 175 SKUs, including 30 varieties of do(From left) Nick Nielsen, financial controller; Brian Miller, president and owner; Mike Walz, COO; and Nick Yeh, chief of staff, lead Miller Baking Co. in its ideals of delivering quality and service to its customers. 36 Baking & Snack May 2018 / www.bakingandsnack.com nuts with different toppings, and managed to squeeze in Pretzilla production wherever it could. "We were producing 24 hours a day, 7 days a week of soft pretzel buns along with all the fresh route items," Mr. Miller said. "We were using literally every square inch of the building, and it wasn't until May 2014 that we actually moved into a dedicated facility for Pretzilla and put in automated equipment." Moving Pretzilla into its own facility was key to Miller Baking Co.'s growth. "I held off growth because there was only so much room and so much time," he said. Wanting to carefully manage the business, Mr. Miller had been slow to invest in more space. Being at capacity, however, forced him to make a move. In 2012, he bought a new facility for Pretzilla production. Eventually the building was expanded it to its current 30,000 sq ft. Production started in the facility two years later. This new bakery, the Steven Road facility, houses one production line and four packaging lines. The flexibility of the Gemini Bakery Equipment makeup line allows