The purpose of a bakery is to create and provide a wide variety of freshly baked goods to sell to customers. Beyond simply making bread, pastries, cakes, and other treats, bakeries can sometimes offer other food and drinks as well. They cater to people’s taste preferences and dietary needs, offering options ranging from traditional classics to innovative creations.
While each bakery is different, there are some things they all have in common:
- Cleanliness is key – you’ll need to be diligent about keeping workspaces clean and sanitary.
- You’ll need to love food – a lot of your job will revolve around making, marketing, and selling baked goods to customers.
- Communication is important too – both with customers and co-workers.
Key Outcome
Create delicious baked goods
The key outcome of a bakery is to provide a wide variety of baked foods to customers, both the public and wholesale.
Key Tasks
- Mix and knead dough
- Bake and monitor oven temperatures
- Decorate and ice baked goods
- Prepare fillings and toppings
- Package and display baked goods
- Take customer orders and provide excellent service
- Clean and maintain equipment and workstations
- Manage inventory and restock ingredients
- Develop new recipes and test ingredients
- Follow food safety and hygiene regulations
Industry
You can find bakeries in the manufacturing and retail trade industries
Bakeries are generally found in the manufacturing and retail trade industries. There are a few different kinds of bakeries, including patisseries, savory bakeries, and specialty bakeries (such as those that might sell cultural foods).
Work Environment
You can expect regular hours and on-site work
Regular hours | Work on-site | Jobs in metro, regional, and rural areas | Moderate job growth
Most bakeries are open early in the mornings and operate until late afternoon. Some workers are required to start very early in order to ensure goods are prepared for the day, but this means they also get to finish early too. Bakeries are commonly also open on weekends and some holidays too.
A lot of the work in a bakery needs to be done hands-on, so there is very little opportunity to work remotely or from home, aside from some administrative and marketing roles.
Bakeries are found in both cities and rural areas. The kinds of bakeries you’ll find in both might differ too – in urban areas you might find more specialised, artisan bakeries, while rural areas may have bakeries that specialise in farm-to-table products.
The Career Clusters you’ll find in a bakery
People from all Clusters are needed for bakery to run successfully, but the most common Clusters you’ll find are Makers and Linkers. In many roles, you might find yourself performing tasks across multiple Clusters.
