One Thousand Ways to Make a Living; or, An Encyclopædia of Plans to Make Money

by Harold Morse Dunphy

The chances for success are as great in the baking industry as in any other. Look about you a bit. It is very seldom you hear or read about the failure of a well-established bakeshop. The people must have bread. Good bread making is not at all difficult. Your chances to make and to sell good bread are just as good as those of your competitor-baker. Baking is a stable industry. There are large profits in the industry when well conducted. Your chances for success, therefore, are good, because the proprietor’s chances for success have always been good. Many examples might be pointed out to you of owners of bakeries who 10 to 20 years ago began in a small way and who to-day are baking from 25,000 to 100,000 loaves per day.

Qualifications

For the owner of a bakery the personal characteristics required for success in a large way are about the same as for other occupations and professions. He must keep abreast of the times by constant study and application. Of course a man must be honest. He must be determined to give full weight. It seems so easy in a bakeshop to cut the weight of a loaf by one-half to 1 ounce and thus reap a temporary advantage, and so it is; but as in other businesses, “honesty is the best policy,” and the baker who has the reputation for giving full weight generally gains in the end, and the one who is known to skimp on his weight will eventually find that policy a losing game. A proprietor must be a hard worker; he is liable to be required to work at any time of day or night. He must be a man who can get along with men, one to win their confidences, cooperation, and best endeavors.

A master baker should be able to manage men so as to get the most out of them consistent with decency and fair play. He should have an intimate knowledge of flours and of the other ingredients used in baking. He should be well posted in the art of baking in all its phases, and have enough ambition to keep posted and abreast of the times.

The other employees of a bakery do not need so many of the qualifications possessed by the master baker so long as they are content to remain where they are, but if they are planning to become master bakers themselves they must make up their minds to obtain this very training. Many soldiers have already had considerable experience in field bakeries. They will find this experience of great value in commercial bakeries. However, previous training and experience in the Army is not an essential, inasmuch as sufficient experience can be had in several months’ study at a trade school to satisfy the requirements of beginners. Men who aspire to forge ahead in a bakery must have “pep,” be alert to learn, and must apply themselves studiously. They should have a natural aptitude for the work, for the best work can never be done in any line where there is no love and enthusiasm.

Training and Experience

Formerly, bakers learned their profession through the apprenticeship. While that system is also in vogue to-day, yet many men are being given a tremendous boost by first attending a trade school for bakers or a technical school, college, or university. In going through the apprenticeship stage, a man would be very greatly assisted if he had at least an eighth-grade education or better still a high school or college education. The trade school will in the course of six to nine months’ intensive training not only train a man to bake a good loaf of bread, but will teach him to know the characteristics of the ingredients which are used in baking and how to detect or determine their quality. He will acquire a chemical knowledge of these raw materials. He will also learn to have a thorough knowledge of baking machinery and how to handle ovens. After such a schooling, he should make fast progress as an apprentice.

Schools of Baking

Among the schools offering training for bakers may be mentioned the Dunwoody Institute at Minneapolis, the University of Minneapolis at University Farm, Minn., the Kansas Agricultural College at Manhattan, and a number of trade schools proper at Chicago—the Columbus Laboratory, Operative Miller, and Siebel Institute.

It should always be recognized that a general education is a great aid on the road to success, and that an ambition to keep pace with the improvements in methods, changes in materials and appliances will be rewarded by more rapid promotion. One of the best ways of maintaining the pace is to read the various journals devoted to milling and baking and to associate one’s self with societies specializing in milling and baking.