Back to news Food Manufacture December feature npd - snacks - 23 October 2002 Snacks and Snacking - Speedibake Spot Trends Snacks and snacking, eating on the hoof, are a growing trend. The pace of weekday living is faster and snacks are often taking the place of a meal particularly breakfast and at mid-day. Speedibake, one of the UK's leading bakery companies have invested heavily in npd and developed a number of variations to the traditional snack. Sweet or savoury, Speedibake have the ideal snack solution. This includes doughnuts and muffins, as well as a range of innovative speciality breads to make snacking a tastier, more exciting alternative to a meal. Speedibake's marketing director Tony Lucas comments, "Snacking is an accepted way of life, as people become busier and pace of life faster. Consumers are looking for a light wholesome snack that can be easily eaten on the move. They also want something that will not only fill the gap but is tasty, innovative and will take a variety of interesting fillings." For the ideal sandwich snack, Speedibake breads include baguettes, demi baguettes and petit pains and for something really different in sandwich wraps there's the Speedibake Calzone. Calzone is a circular sandwich bread that is ready folded into a 'traco' semi-circular shape. Made from a recipe containing sun-dried tomatoes, it has an authentic Italian taste and an attractive marbled appearance. The Calzones are supplied frozen to caterers, who can then thaw and serve, simply adding a sandwich filling of their choice. Speedibake's Calzones taste great with a variety of fillings. Particularly recommended are those with an Italian flavour such as chicken with pesto or goats cheese with salad. For a sweet treat snack, there are Speedibake's range of doughnuts, including the jumbo doughnut with raspberry flavoured jam filling, chocolate iced ring doughnut or mini ring doughnut, together with Speedibake's standard and muchroom muffins in a variety of flavours including Blueberry , Chocolate Chip and double Chocolate and the spicy Chelsea and Belgian buns. Speedibake have recently completed U&A research, which has given them an even clearer and more comprehensive definition and understanding of the bakery marketplace, in line with consumers' own criteria for segmentation. It highlighted growing trends and changing eating habits. This research coupled with Speedibake's impressive new product development programme, ensures it is well placed to meet consumers' current and predicted demands, including new tastes in snacking, with an innovative and focused new product development programme. The new product development programme was made possible with the introduction of Speedibake’s new state-on-the-art speciality bread plant, which combines flexibility with volume production. The new plant allows a huge variety of shapes as well as hand cutting and topping. Hand crafting, together with a new 'scrabbler' and volcanic stone oven and slow prover, gives the authentic taste and artisnal look that consumers are demanding.