“FRITSCH Bakery Systems has more than 25 years of experience in the turnkey sector. During this period, projects have been successfully developed and implemented on every continent of the world. Our big advantage is to dispose of the expertise how the individual machines must be designed for forming a perfectly working complete production line. Only if everything is adapted correctly, the interfaces are functioning without any problems and contribute to an efficient and safe production. Whether if customers are investors who are planning a production site up from the drawing, branch bakers who want to produce on an industrial scale or regional artisan bakers who want to stand out in terms of quality from your competitors – FBS designs the necessary solutions and makes them a reality.”

Anna-Maria Fritsch Head of Marketing and Process Management

German company FRITSCH, which is well known in the world of baking for high-quality engineering, high levels of reliable technology, efficient lines and pioneering innovation within the sector of dough sheeting and processing, is exporting 80 percent of its production. The company which is providing turnkey projects in many parts of the world has won the tender for the bread factory that will be established in Hadımköy-İstanbul by İstanbul Public Bread and raised its sights for the Turkish market. World leading German company’s two senior managers answered the questions of BBM Magazine. Anna-Maria FRITSCH, Head of Marketing and Process Management and Ulrich Hirsch, Head of FRITSCH Bakery Systems GmbH, said that the company is very active in the Turkish and Middle East markets and these are extremely stable markets for them. They expressed that FRITSCH has growth plans for this region and they give high primacy to the Turkish market.

Anna-Maria Fritsch and Ulrich Hirsch’s answers to the questions of BBM are as follows:

You, as FRITSCH Bakery Systems, are providing solutions in all areas ranging from handicraftsman furnaces, industrial furnaces regardless of they need components or complete lines. Can you give us some information about the activities of your company? The FRITSCH Bakery Systems (FBS) supplies customized, complete and turnkey solutions for the baking industry. Our customers decide which bakery product they would like to produce and we, as FBS, will ensure that they are able to do this in the desired quality and on the expected quantity. No matter whether it involves a new build or the modification and upgrading of existing production facilities. As the market and product trends in the baking industry continuously require new and innovative solutions of the highest quality, it is crucial to have one supplier that can handle all aspects of the project management. Thus, FBS is managing everything from the beginning to the end: the targeted product development at the FRITSCH Technology Centre, the selection of the suppliers to installation and far into the use phase. Engineering and technology as well as service from a single source are required.

FBS has more than 25 years of experience in the turnkey sector. During this period, projects have been successfully developed and implemented on every continent of the world. Our big advantage is to dispose of the expertise how the individual machines must be designed for forming a perfectly working complete production line. Only if everything is adapted correctly, the interfaces are functioning without any problems and contribute to an efficient and safe production.

A recent example of a typical FBS project was for a complete turnkey project to produce a variety of par-baked and packaged breads and rolls for a supermarket chain.

The customer had absolutely no experience in bread production and so relied on FBS to supply the entire project from silo’s to packaging. FBS has delivered the project and the supermarket is now producing 6 tons of breads per hour on an IMPRESSA industrial bread line.

Subsequent to the successful completion of this project, the customer has now ordered a further 3 systems with similar capabilities.

Whether if customers are investors who are planning a production site up from the drawing, branch bakers who want to produce on an industrial scale or regional artisan bakers who want to stand out in terms of quality from your competitors – FBS designs the necessary solutions and makes them a reality.

You are active in the area of dough processing apart from cooking. Can you give some information about the size of the company, annual production amount and export? FBS operates as a division of the FRITSCH Group. We are a close team of 12 industry experts focused on the planning and delivery of complete turnkey solutions.

Besides the expertise in the FBS team, we also have all of the resources of the wider FRITSCH Group available for support on a full range of processes and technologies.

The family-owned company is run in the 4th generation for more than 90 years. Close to 600 employees are now working hard to ensure the success of the company. More than 50 international sales and service partners guarantee proximity to customers in all markets. Moreover, FRITSCH has subsidiaries in Russia, Poland, the USA and the UK. Together we reach a turnover of more than 100 Mio. Euro annually. 80 percent of it is earned with international projects. FRITSCH runs an extremely modern 4,600-square-metreTtechnology Centre for research purposes and for its customers.

Turkey and Middle East are markets in which you are very active. What is your investment plans and targets towards this market? Turkey and the Middle East are certainly stable markets for FBS, they are core regions with a requirement for flexible lines, short changeover times and hygienic design. Of course the level of automation continues to increase, but it will also be one of the core elements of our company to offer suitable and innovative solutions to small and middle-sized bakeries. In this segment we also benefit from the experience gained from our many different industrial projects. In this sense FRITSCH is not only a machine supplier, but we are also a solutions provider.

Considering our growth plans for this region we are committed to the Turkish market as high priority. We will build a customer service team in this market area that offers our full-service package to offer support for our customers in their day-to-day work processes with FRITSCH machines.

Why are FRITSCH machines and lines being preferred in the global scale? In which regions are you active the most? 80% of FRITSCH’s total turnover is export. In addition to the Middle East we supply major producers in North America, Russia, China and of course Europe. Customers appreciate our passion for dough and the related passion for technology. Thus, we have extremely high requirements in every aspect of engineering. The reason for such high requirements is that FRITSCH machines and lines are adjusted to our customers’ recipes and processes and not the other way around. We do not demand that customers change their recipes to meet the technology’s requirements. We want to give our customers a level of flexibility which allows them to manufacture their desired traditional products as well as new product creations and trends. No matter how huge or small the volume of output is.

What is the top feature distinguishing you from your rivals? Compared to our competitors FRITSCH is well known in the world of baking for high quality engineering, high levels of reliable technology, efficient lines and pioneering innovation within the sector of dough sheeting and processing. It stands out from its competitors due to its creative engineering and sometimes unconventional solutions, e.g. the pretzel machine MULTITWIST or the IMPRESSA croissant with its unique cutting and turning unit (CCT) as well as its bending unit (CBS). FRITSCH’s machines are used worldwide to produce premium bakery products for artisan bakeries and industrial-sized bakeries alike.

Moreover, we already have a numerous references in the Middle East. Many of them are the biggest producers of baked goods and are supported by our experienced sales staff who are familiar with their cultures and languages.

* Can you give some information about the technology you make use of during the production? Thanks to the SoftProcessing Technology of FRITSCH, we offer our customers production systems and technical solutions that perfectly combine precise shaping, gentle dough handling and reproducible processes along with the highest production rates.

An important customized large-scale project is the implementation of a complete turnkey solution of three industrial bread lines. In our partnership with Halk Ekmek Istanbul the realization of this project concentrates on using a fully automated long-term dough fermentation process in order to produce high quality bread products. Halk Ekmek Istanbul is also an important reference customer for our latest innovation the SDS (soft dough sheeter). The SDS represents an outstanding innovation in the FRITSCH SoftProcessing Technology that will be launched and presented at iba 2018 for the first time. The SDS is a design-engineering solution which combines consistent dough compression and gentle dough handling whilst also avoiding strand twisting. Namely, Francella bread, known as Ekmek, pide, ciabatta rolls, baguettes, round moulded bread and bread rolls are examples for handling very soft doughs with a high ratio of water. Halk Ekmek represents the huge business potential of FRITSCH bread machines and lines. With this in mind FRITSCH also has a wide range of special dough processing machines to imitate artisan processing. With FRITSCH sheeting lines we enable our customers to process dough types with long pre-proofing and/or very high water content (up to 85% water), which are very hard to handle in a manual process.

You are a company which active in the many parts of the world. What are the popular trends in the bakery nowadays? According to your observation, producers in which country use the latest technology? Of course some trends depend on the country and the specific market environments. But we also see some transnational developments. Customers are looking for individual and creative new products which may also be produced with more natural ingredients. Most of these products are based on traditional handmade products already in the market. This is a challenge we face again and again in our Technology Center where we have the facility and the experts to develop new products or processes together with our clients. And this means also for us as a supplier that customers ask more and more for modular and flexible lines where a wide range of different specific niche products can be produced. Or the line is used for testing new products with a small amount to prove the market acceptance. Moreover, there still is a worldwide trend for international standard products such as baguette or croissants. These are core products in our range of machines and for these type of machines we are certainly the market leader.

Furthermore consumption patterns of baked goods changed over the last years. On the one hand people eat more products on-the-go so the demand for snack and convenient products increases. And on the other hand we see an increasing market for high quality, clean label and artisan-looking bread products with high water content. This is a segment we started to focus on years ago with our IMPRESSA bread lines.

* What kind of contributions do your products provide to the customers in terms of food safety and raw material waste? Food safety: Our customers feel a natural responsibility to sell only products manufactured using the highest food safety standards. One example for these kind of products are croissants with a long shelf life. To guarantee this high level of quality and safety we are selling the customer the complete solution and not only a parts of the process. Selling the complete solution means we are responsible for the complete process and the quality of the end product.

Reducing raw material waste is an important topic for us as well, thus we optimize constantly our machines and components to produce and process dough sheets with little to no rework. For example the FRITSCH dough sheeters can precisely portion even the softest doughs and produce a continuous dough sheet with a very consistent and accurate width.

In many cases we believe that the addition of rework dough increases the quality of dough. Thus, we continue to develop our machines both for directly processing of fresh dough and also dough in an advanced stage. The benefits of this can be customers save valuable raw materials, they are able to reduce time consuming processing of rework therefore achieve cost savings. Additionally, this process can increase the quality of the dough and therefore the quality of bread and bread rolls.

FRITSCH at iba 2018 * Do you want to add anything else? 2018 is a very special year for FRITSCH. First, we are putting our new communication concept into action and second, above all we will be presenting several innovations at iba 2018 that help our customers to optimally meet their market requirements. This includes the impressive advancements we are making in the area of FRITSCH`s Soft Processing Technology.

One of these innovation highlights is the new Soft Dough Sheeter (SDS). Given the trend towards healthy eating, bakers are increasingly processing softer and more developed doughs that classical bakery machines can only process with difficulty. Now, thanks to the special arrangement of its design features, the SDS can precisely portion even the softest doughs and produce a continuous dough sheet. The high weight accuracy of dough blocks, the elimination of height drops, and the fine, uniform dusting with flour ensure smooth production in the truest sense of the word. Artisanal breads and rolls therefore turn out especially well on the SDS, as though they were hand-crafted. The capacity ranges from 800 kg to 5 tons at a dough yield of 165 to 190, depending on the type of flour.

We will also be presenting relevant developments for all of our customer groups – from handicraft bakers and industrial producers to enterprises who are looking for complete turnkey solutions.

Digitalization is continually presenting us with new opportunities to offer even better services to our customers. With FRITSCH’s Smart Services – the first three will be presented at iba 2018 – we are improving, among many other things, the monitoring and maintenance of our lines.

Our new iba 2018 exhibition concept perfectly reflects our corporate philosophy, and is bound to show every customer how our passion for dough and technology is the motivation that drives us towards high performance. Our goal is to familiarize every visitor with the full range of FRITSCH machines and services – through exciting live demonstrations at the booth and through one-to-one talks with our experienced personnel. In addition to this, on Monday, the 17th of September, we will be hosting our FRITSCH & Friends Evening right there at the booth for our customers and partners. On that evening, we will be celebrating our joint successes and toasting to our long-standing productive partnerships. Don’t miss a single exciting innovation! Visit us at iba 2018, Hall A2, Booth 111.