Albany Bakeries’ Story – The 50+ Years Old Bread Brand

Albany Bakeries is one of South Africa’s major producers of bread products, and a major player in the FMCG sector with its 13+ regional production sites supplying over 10.5 million households each week with bread and other baked goods such as rolls, buns and baps.

The largest portion of Albany’s consumer base is the middle to upper income market segment but the company also has a variety of breads that serve other markets with more specific dietary requirements.

Albany’s brands include Superior, Olde Cape and D’light and the range includes white, brown, wholemeal, muesli and fruit, brown seed, white ‘best of both’ and white and brown low GI, and also the much loved Tinkies.

Albany is an award-winning brand in the bread category in South Africa and has several accolades under its belts.’

These include the 2016/2017 TGI SA’s Kasi Star Brands; 2017/2018 Icon Brand Awards and the Sunday Times Top Brands Awards.

Background

During 1970s, Tiger Brands(then called Tiger Oats) and National Milling acquired a number of independent bakeries to create Albany Bakeries. In 1983, Albany bakery in Germiston was completed which became the largest bakery at that time and represented 20% of the baking industry in SA.

Albany has been around for over 50 years but in the first 30 years of its existence, the bread industry was regulated by the government which meant that:

1. Each Bakery had their own allocated quota of products which they had to produce.
2. Punitive measures were in place if they under or over supplied.
3. Prices were fixed by the government.
4. There was no differentiation, poor quality and no innovation in the market.

Following the deregulation of the bread industry in 1991, the market has since become fiercely competitive with price being the main weapon used between competitors. This eroded the profitability within the industry and created a commodity market.

As a direct result of the government’s deregulation, all bread producers were forced to review their business strategies and consumer relationships, in order to survive.

In 2000, Albany made some drastic changes to ensure its survival, the key area of change was to reduce the number of bakeries around the country and install state of the art production equipment in order to launch the Albany Superior range.

The Albany Superior range offered high-level quality which encompassed longer shelf life, freshness, and whiter “white” bread. This new innovation turned the market on its head and ensured the continued growth of the company as well as the market.

In late 2003, the company once again shaked the industry by bringing launching the ‘Best of Both’ bread after research showed that children loved white bread and wouldn’t eat brown or wholewheat bread, which parents wanted them to eat for the added health benefits (essentially the fibre levels).

In August 2017, Albany Bakeries announced the launch of a new bakery worth R350 million in Bellville.

The bakery has a new technology equipment that reduces the carbon footprint and the upgrade of interiors of the existing plan. The entire new building occupies 6 884 square metres compared to an area of 3 766 square metres in the old bakery. The total yard size is 16190 square meters and includes new roads for delivery and commercial vehicles.

The bakery operates 24 hours, seven days a week and trucks leave the yard from 3am to 6am and services 5 000 outlets in its coverage area from large supermarket chains to independent retailers and spaza shops.

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