Baked Earth Brand Baker, Butt Foods, Expands Into Retail

Specialist naan bread and flat bread bakery Butt Foods has expanded into the retail sector with its Baked Earth brand as part of a plan to diversify.

The third generation Nottingham-based company, which is celebrating 30 years in the bakery business this year, has historically mainly supplied the foodservice sector.

But the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the company’s plans to diversify into retail and it has now announced a raft of retail listings in the UK and Europe with its brand, Baked Earth.

Butt Foods has signed contracts to supply five major retailers with around 2,100 stores in total, including a major export deal with a company that has more than 600 stores in mainland Europe.

Butt Foods Managing Director Dan Butt said: “Our Baked Earth brand of naan breads and flat breads is very popular in the foodservice sector, and is served in pubs, bars, cafés, restaurants, hotels, sandwich shops, casual dining outlets, universities and other venues. This sector was obviously badly hit during lockdown but fortunately for Butt Foods we had begun to diversify into the retail sector just before the pandemic started – a process which we accelerated during lockdown, and which has been very successful. We saw the opportunities and were able to quickly adapt our business to supply to retail, as well as foodservice.”

Butt Foods has its roots in the first curry house in Nottingham, opened in 1973, which developed an outstanding reputation for their naans.

“Butt Foods was founded on an opportunity 30 years ago and we have taken the opportunities we have identified in recent times to diversify and strengthen the business,” added Butt. “During lockdown, we worked hard to focus on extending our customer base, often remotely, and we were really pleased to win a number of taste panels and to subsequently secure listings in household-name retail chains.”

The retail side will account for around 25% of the business, he estimates.

Butt Foods, which is based on Lenton Lane Industrial Estate, Nottingham, produces a range of naan breads in different flavors, shapes and sizes, including garlic and coriander and plain, as well as flatbreads, such as its rectangular folded flatbread.

Last year the company gained Vegan Society accreditation for its core range of naan and flatbreads and in 2018 it was highly commended at the Food Manufacture Excellence Awards.