Jim Brown

Chairman’s Report

Chairman’s Report 12th October, 2022

We continued with Zoom committee meetings for 2021 – 2022. Sadly, we could not hold the 2021 BSB Golf Day or the Autumn Conference due to Covid.

We did however have a lively 2021 Zoom AGM which was combined  with a webinar type presentation by Devon Petrie, National Bakery School, South Bank University on the use insects to increase the protein content of baked products. Devon covered the topic in great detail, including the financial and legal aspects of producing baked products with insects and as an ingredient. There were also tasting samples. A video of Devon’s presentation and the 2021 AGM is available as a download on the BSB website archives.

The 2022 Spring Conference was held at the Tythe Barn, Bicester on Wednesday 6th April, 2022, our first conference since autumn 2019 due to Covid! Both the conference attendance and presentations were excellent.

The conference attendance was higher than normal because a) members were happy to be attending a conference again and b) because of the presentations and discussions on the Ukraine crisis and its likely adverse effect on wheat availability worldwide. Speaker Alex Waugh of UK Flour Millers, formerly NABIM, started his presentation by saying that he will be able to talk of the effect of the crisis on wheat supply, price and quality but let’s not forget this Crisis is being caused by a war and the human cost of that will be awful!

An informal conference dinner was held at the Chesterton Hotel on the Tuesday evening and was enjoyed by speakers, guests and BSB Executive committee members and delegates, the attendance being higher than usual due to the additional Ukraine crisis delegates.

The Spring BSB Conference presentations lived up to their promise to provide advice, strategy, and vision and a forum for discussion. Peter Baker did a fantastic job as Session Chairman for all the presentations.

09.30 – 09.40 Opening of Conference by BSB Chairman Mark Young, including the presentation of the BSB chain of office to Mark by Past Chairman Richard Hazeldine and the presentation of Richard’s Past Chairman’s Badge by Mark, which could not previously be done due to Covid restrictions

What Do Today’s Young Bakers Need? by Megan Roberts and Will Leet, David Wood, Bakery

The Wrights Journey to Compleat by Ian Dobbie

Are Bakeries Heading Towards Full Automation? by Steve Merritt, EPP

Panel Discussion on the effect of the Ukraine crisis on UK Milling and Baking 

Practice Essential Skills: Motivation, Leadership, Growth by David Garman

The Next Generation – Moving Business on by Talia and Sean Sarafilovic, Stephen’s Bakery

PDF copies of the speakers PowerPoint presentations can be found on the 2022 spring conference page of the BSB website.

2022 BSB Golf Day 

The 2022 BSB Golf Day was held at the Forest of Arden Golf & Country Club, Meriden, Warwickshire on Tuesday 31st May 2022. The cost of the day included coffee and bacon rolls on arrival, a token for the driving range, 18 holes of golf over the Arden championship golf course in the familiar shotgun start format, and afterwards a three-course dinner followed by the prize giving ceremony. There were several non-golfers who attended for the dinner only.

Long-time golf day organizer Keith Houliston  planned two years ago to celebrate 30 continuous years of the event with a special prize, but Covid intervened! The special prize was therefore awarded this year instead.

Keith was pleased to pay tribute to Chairman Mark’s brother Simon, who did a fantastic job as the after-dinner speaker and presenter of prizes. He said that Simon was very entertaining and a talented impressionist. We also  saved the normal fee for a professional comedian against Simon’s attendance and hotel cost, including a good quality bottle of champagne.  The results of the Golf Day will be posted on the Golf Day page of the website.

Mark Young, BSB Chairman 

Chairman’s Report

This is my third year as Chairman and has like the other two flown by, sadly as you are all aware we have been unable to undertake any of our usual activities.  We had hoped to be able to hold our autumn conference, but once it became clear that we were unable to do so with any certainty we took swift and decisive action to mitigate any costs to the society and postponed the event until Autumn 2022.

At our AGM last year, I mentioned that we were investigating ways in which we could continue promote learning within the baking industry.  One of the ways we looked at was via webinars.  Immediately following our AGM we held our first webinar – Adam Cohen of ITS told us “how to do business better – now and after Covid!” 

Following the success of our first webinar, we have managed to host a series of webinars during the course of the last year.

Our second was with Mintel, Emma Clifford outlined “How Covid-19 is changing the future of bread and baked goods”

We then had two webinars provided by Synergy Flavours, Adam Byrne, gave a presentation on “Reformulating bakery products to reduce calories”.  This was followed by Natalie Sheil presenting “Key drivers for Vegan growth.”

Our 5th webinar was from John Ruddock, of Cooplands who shared some of “the key lessons learnt from the pandemic and how this has shaped their plans for the future.”  and then Jane Tyler of Cybake  walked us through the “the changing landscape of IT in the bakery sector, including a look at the application of artificial intelligence.”

Our final webinar was in September when Fraser Tait of Food Tech Systems gave us useful guidance on the Natasha’s Law & Allergen Labelling Update that came into effect last Friday.

However I am pleased to say that we are pushing ahead with plans for our Spring Conference which will be held at the Tythe Barn near Bicester in April next year.  I am really looking forward to seeing as many of you as possible there.

The conferences were not the only casualty of the pandemic, sadly we were unable to hold our annual golf day this year.  Keith Houliston is well underway with plans to bounce back in 2022.  Thank you Keith.

Predictably I have been unable to represent the society at any of the usual bakery events.  Although we have maintained our links with different organisations through invitations to our webinars.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank our supporters, you will have seen their logos being displayed ahead of the proceedings today. The BSB is a not for profit organisation dedicated to promoting learning within the baking industry.  Their generosity is very much appreciated, and their support enables us to achieve this aim.

The committee has been working tirelessly in the background.  We now have more regular but shorter meetings via Zoom.  Going forward we will look to introduce a couple of face to face committee meetings each year.

Behind the scenes a lot of work has been going on.  You may well have noticed changes to the website.  This is very much a work in progress we are giving the website a makeover and bring it up to date.  I would like to thank Natalie for taking this on.

One of the challenges facing the society has been succession planning. At one stage we were having to look at outsourcing our conference organisation.  We have made significant steps forwards. We have recruited new committee members who have been very active in the Society and we now are back to organising webinars & conferences inhouse.  Following this AGM we will welcome Daren Roots to the committee.

I am also pleased to say that the position of Chairman looks to be covered for the next few years.

We did have a set back with our plan for a replacement Treasurer, in that David Hall had to resign from the committee for personal reasons.  I would like to thank David for the support and work he did for the BSB.  I am pleased to say that later in the meeting we will be looking to appoint John Gelley as honorary treasurer.

Finally I would like to thank the committee for their support not just during the last year, but also over the last three years.  We have faced some very challenging times, we have had to make some difficult decisions and at times we have had some robust discussions.  But above all we have remained a well-functioning committee and going forward you can be assured that the BSB is in good hands.

Richard Hazeldine

5^th October 2021