Having the right bakery equipment is crucial to running a successful bakery and restaurant business. Like other restaurant supplies and equipment, it is important to invest in high quality bakery tools and equipment when starting a bakery or baking subscription box business.
A number of things go into opening a bakery. These include choosing the right bakery design and interior décor, making great recipes of baked goods to sell, and having a solid eCommerce marketing plan.
Key Takeaway - Using the right bakery tools and equipment will save you time and help you make more money. High quality bakery equipment will help you create the perfect desserts, cakes, breads, and other baked goods.
So, what equipment do you need for your bakery to achieve the highest level of success? Let’s look at the essential bakery equipment list for every baker.
What Equipment is Needed to Start a Bakery?
As a bakery owner, it is important you have specialized equipment for your bakery to reach the highest level of efficiency. Bread and pastry shops, cake shops, and ice-cream shops require different types of tools and machines.
For instance, bakeries that specialize in making cakes, having the right tools and equipment is important. Although basic cake modeling can be done by hand, It is easier to use cake making and decorating equipment to make cakes professionally.
There are a number of things to consider before buying bakery equipment. We’ll get to that part in a bit.
First, let’s review the ultimate equipment list for a bakery business.
Ultimate Equipment List for a Bakery
Bakery Kitchen Equipment
This category of bakery equipment and tools includes the basic kitchen equipment every baker needs to get started with their bakery business. Basic kitchen tools are usually affordable and you don’t have to worry about the high maintenance costs, unlike heavy equipment.
Let’s check some basic bakery equipment out:
- Measuring Tools in Bakery
Measuring tools come in all shapes and sizes. Like the name suggests, they are used for taking accurate measurements of dry and wet ingredients like flour, sugar, milk.
- Dry Measuring Cup
Uses: You can use dry measuring cups to weigh dry ingredients such as spices, salt, flour, sugar, or baking powder.
Size: Comes in four standard sizes - ¼ cups, ⅓ cups, ½ cups, and 1 cup.
Types: Measuring cups are available as plastic, stainless steel, and porcelain.
- Liquid Measuring Cup
Uses: You can use a liquid measuring cup to measure wet ingredients like milk, yogurt, or water.
Size: Usually comes with graduated measurement lines and in liters, centiliters, and milliliters.
Types: Liquid measuring cups are usually made of transparent plastic or glass.
- Measuring Spoon
Uses: You can use measuring spoons to measure small quantities of wet or dry baking ingredients.
Size: Measuring spoons typically come in sets of four and six spoons with different measurements and sizes.
Types: Measuring spoons some in plastic, metal, and other materials.
- Baking Scale and Spoon Scale
Uses: Baking scales and spoon scales can accurately measure food ingredients conveniently.
Size: Baking scales and spoon scales are digital scales and come in grams and ounces. Depending on the type of scale you buy, baking scales have different measuring capacities.
Types: Baking scales are either digital with automatic measurement features, or analog.
- Timer
Uses: You can use a timer to time the preparation of ingredients and cooking of the food.
Size: A timer typically has a countdown of up to 60 minutes.
Types: Digital timers, Egg times, and so on.
- Oven Thermometer
Uses: An oven thermometer is used to measure the temperature of oil, water, and food when using the oven. It can also be used to measure the temperature when melting chocolate.
Size: The temperature range is usually between 60 degrees and 580 degrees Fahrenheit.
Types: Digital instant-read, dial oven-safe thermometer, digital fork thermometer, and dial instant-read thermometer.
- Mixing Tools in Bakery
Mixing tools are used for mixing ingredients, either wet or dry. Some can also be used to store and knead doughs. There are both manual and automatic mixing tools available.
- Electric Mixers
Uses: Electric mixers are automatic mixing tools that can automate the mixing process. They can be used to whisk eggs and other wet ingredients. When a dough hook is attached, you can also use an electric mixer to knead dough.
Types: Handheld electric mixers and stand mixers.
- Mixing Spoon
Uses: Mixing spoons come in different lengths and are used for mixing ingredients in containers. They are easy to use and can make life easy for any baker.
Types: Metal mixing spoons, wood mixing spoons, porcelain mixing spoons, and plastic mixing spoons.
- Mixing Bowls
Uses: You can use mixing bowls to prepare and mix dry and wet baking ingredients. Mixing bowls are also used to store and knead doughs.
Types: Glass mixing bowls, stainless steel mixing bowls, plastic mixing bowls, and porcelain mixing bowls.
- Whisks
Uses: Similar to electric mixers, whisks are used to mix ingredients smoothly.
Types: French whisks, balloon whisks, flat whisks, spring whisks, and ball whisks.
- Spatula
Uses: Spatulas are flat and flexible mixing tools used for mixing and scraping mixing bowls and plates.
Types: Silicone spatula, stainless steel spatula, rubber spatula, and plastic spatula.
- Preparatory Tools in Bakery
Preparatory tools and equipment in the bakery are used for the initial preparation of baking ingredients. They are essential parts of your bakery kitchen that you need to open your bakery business.
- Flour Sifter
Uses: Bakers use flour sifters to sieve or separate clumps from bulk flour, baking powder, and other powder-like ingredients. A flour sifter ensures that your ingredients are an even consistency.
Types: Battery-operated flour sifters, electric flour sifters, and stainless steel flour sifters.
- Pastry Brush
Uses: Pastry brushes are used to spread butter, egg wash, or oil on food.
Types: Silicone bristles pastry brush and natural bristles pastry brush
- Cake Tester
Uses: A cake tester needle helps bakers to check if the cake is baked well without causing damage to the cake. They can also be used as cake decorations and exhaust needles. Although you can simply use a long toothpick to check for the doneness of cakes.
Types: Stainless steel cake tester
- Baking Paper
Uses: Baking paper is usually lined in baking pans so food can bake better and to prevent the food from touching the pan directly. Using baking paper will also save you a lot of cleaning troubles.
Types: Silicone mat. Parchment paper, wax paper, aluminum foil, and plastic wrap.
- Pastry Mat
Uses: Pastry mats are non-stick surfaces that bakers use for kneading, forming, and cutting dough.
Types: Silicone pastry mat, marble pastry mat, and granite pastry mat.
- Egg Separator
Uses: Egg separators help to separate egg yolks from egg whites.
Types: Easy squeeze silicone egg separators.
- Cooling Rack
Uses: A cooling rack allows air to flow and circulate around baked food. This ensures that the food is cooled when out of the oven.
Types: Stainless steel cooling racks, chrome-coated cooling racks, and aluminum cooling racks
- Cutting Tools in Bakery
Cutting tools are essential items you need to start your bakery business.
- Grater
Uses: Graters are used for shredding food ingredients, such as lemon, cheese, carrots, and other items, into smaller sizes.
Types: Box grater, rasp grater, rotary grater, spice grater, hand grater, and electric grater.
- Pastry Blender
Uses: A pastry blender or dough blender is used for blending solid ingredients like butter, or lard, into flour or other powder-like ingredients to create a dough.
Types: Stainless steel pastry blender.
- Cookie Cutters
Uses: Cookie cutters are molds with sharp edges that are used for cutting dough into different shapes.
Types: Plastic cookie cutters, aluminum cookie cutters, stainless steel cookie cutters, and copper cookie cutters.
- Dough Cutters
Uses: Dough cutters are used for slicing and portioning out dough.
Types: Thin plastic dough cutters, rubber dough cutters, and stainless steel dough cutters.
- Pastry Cutting Wheel
Uses: Pastry cutting wheels are used for cutting dough and making patterned edges.
Types: Manual pastry cutting wheel, multiple wheel pastry cutter.
- Chef’s Knives
Uses: A knife is used for cutting and chopping large food items into smaller pieces. You can also use knives for peeling and coring fruits and vegetables.
Types: Paring knife, carving knife, Boning knife, and bread knife.
- Cake Making and Decorating Tools
No bakery equipment list is complete without cake making and decorating tools.
- Cake Turntable Stand
Uses: A cake turntable stand is used for smoothing sheets of icing, applying buttercream, pipe frosting, and decorating cake.
- Cake Board
Uses: A cake board is a flat and thick board used for supporting and carrying cakes.
Types: Corrugated cardboard, marble cake board
- Cake Leveler
Uses: A cake leveler is used for cutting and leveling cakes in order to ensure stability.
Types: Ring cutter with knife and ring cutter with single or more thin blades.
- Cake Spatula
Uses: Cake spatulas are used for smoothing out icing and buttercream on the surface and sides of cakes.
Bakery Machine Equipment
This category reviews the heavy machinery and equipment you need in your bakery. If you manufacture or sell them, know that they're some of the most high demand products for a bakery. Let’s check out what they are.
Refrigerators and Freezers
Uses: Freezers and refrigerators are used to chill and preserve foods and baked goods.
Types: Chest freezers, drawer freezers, upright freezers, portable freezers, walk-in freezers, and cube freezers.
Ovens
Uses: Ovens are the soul and life of every bakery. They are used to bake and cook pastries, cakes, pies, breads, cookies, and other baked goods. Meanwhile, certain models like deck ovens will allow you to bake more items at once.
Types: Combination ovens, convection ovens, conventional gas ovens, conventional electric ovens, deck ovens, toaster ovens, and microwave ovens.
Display Cases
Uses: Display cases are used to show ready-to-eat, ready-to-buy, and freshly baked goods.
Types: Bread case, display bin, cake stand, and bulk bin.
POS System
Uses: A bakery or restaurant POS platform streamlines your bakery management processes. With a POS system, you can easily integrate restaurant inventory management software, invoice management software, and order management solutions to run your business.
Bakery Safety Equipment
Complying with food safety regulations is a must, if you want to stay in business. Besides consumer food safety, it is important to keep your employees safe from bakery accidents as well. Here’s a list of safety equipment to purchase for your bakery:
- Gloves
- First aid kit
- Aprons
- Bar rags
- Food grade chemical supplies
- Chemical safety data sheets
- Date labels
- Sani-buckets
6 Things to Consider Before Buying Equipment for Bakery
So, what should you do before buying bakery equipment and tools? Let’s see.
- Budget. It is important to draw out your budget and plan. As a new business owner, it is easy to get carried away by all the expenses that comes with opening your business. Drawing out your business process flow and plan will help you know exactly what you want to do and how you want to do it.
With a financial plan in hand, you can deduce if your business will survive with the money you have at hand or if you need to get a loan. Your budget will also determine the type of bakery equipment you’ll purchase at first.
Most basic bakery equipment are not too expensive. However, heavy machines and commercial bakery equipment will definitely cost a lot of money.
So, lay it all down and review carefully. You can research equipment prices and consider buying second-hand equipment from wholesale distribution companies that sell bakery equipment. - Baking Equipment Supplier. There are a lot of baking equipment suppliers. However, it is important to work with a supplier that sells high quality tools and equipment. It is also crucial that your supplier can balance affordability and quality without compromising.
The best place to find suppliers is using a wholesale marketplace online like BlueCart. You can also reach out to wholesale dropshipping suppliers and vendors that work directly with baking equipment manufacturers.
Before making a purchase, check if the equipment as a warranty. When working with international suppliers, ask beforehand about the shipping and handling fee. - Cost of Maintenance. Another important thing to consider before purchasing bakery equipment is the cost of maintenance. Every machine breaks down after a while, but, the cost of maintaining it should not send you out of business.
Be prepared to do regular servicing and maintenance of the machinery. You can also read about the care of the equipment. - Trainings. When choosing a supplier for your bakery equipment list, make sure they offer additional services such as trainings for the staff. That’s important in order to use the full capacity of the bakery equipment. Bakery businesses often need to organize other trainings for their staff as well. That includes workshops on trendy products, safety trainings, and more.
Most companies that sell bakery equipment also offer after-sales services like installation, maintenance, repairs, and trainings. - Innovations and Automation. As with other sectors in the food industry, there are multiple innovations in the field of baking. Businesses that aim to reduce their labor costs and benefit from modern solutions should constantly look for ways to integrate innovations. Modern bakery equipment helps businesses with mixing, slicing, and baking pastry or other baked food. Furthermore, by investing in the top-notch bakery equipment list, the consistency of your products is guaranteed.
- Scaling. The goal of every business is to increase profits and grow its operations. That’s why when purchasing products from their bakery equipment list, businesses should consider how these tools and machines help them scale their operations. For example, investing in high-end packaging equipment can be especially beneficial for bakery businesses that wish to sell more products to other businesses like grocery stores. Bakeries that work primarily with end customers should be more concerned with the quality of their products and brand awareness. They might find it more beneficial to invest in bakery marketing and lay the groundwork for a successful chain of bakeries.
Frequently Asked Questions About Bakery Equipment
The bakery equipment you get for your business will determine your work output and the general productivity of your business. Here are some frequently asked questions about bakery equipment and tools.
How Much Does Bakery Equipment Cost?
The cost of bakery equipment depends on the cookware and category of equipment you want to purchase. Basic bakery equipment like spatulas and mixing bowls can cost between $12 - $50. Heavy bakery equipment like baking ovens and refrigerators runs between $350 - $15,000. To minimize costs, you can buy used bakery equipment from trusted suppliers.
Are Bakeries Profitable Businesses?
Yes, owning a bakery can be a profitable business if run properly. Here are the main things you need to keep in mind when running a bakery business.
- Invest in good bakery equipment and products. In the field of food preparation, the results are only as good as the equipment and materials used. That’s why owners of bakeries should benefit from modern technology and automation opportunities in order to increase profits, reduce the cost of goods sold, and scale their business.
- Adapt to the demand. Although people buy food primarily to feed themselves, eating can also be an experience for some. That’s why there’s an increasing demand for unique food products or custom-made goods. Baked products are no different. Marketplaces like Etsy have become popular places to sell unique food products.
- Offer services and sell additional products. Although bakeries are primarily associated with selling baked goods, they can add additional revenue streams. For example, a bakery brand can sell its own line of bakery equipment. This can be a great gift for people who enjoy baking from the comfort of their homes. In addition to selling bakery equipment, businesses in this field can offer various services as well. Good examples of that include baking classes, workshops, and even experiences for the whole family.
What Is the Most Important Equipment in a Bakery?
There are a lot of bakery equipment. However, here’s a list of the most important baking tools:
- Measuring cups
- Dough mixers
- Dough dividers
- Dough sheeter
- Rolling pin
- Oven
- Refrigerator
- Knives
- Mixing bowls
- Safety equipment
How Much Money Does it Take to Start a Bakery?
To start a bakery business, you need between $10,000 and $50,000. However, this amount depends on your other overhead expenses, equipment costs, rent, and, labor costs.
What Is the Difference Between Bakery Equipment and Restaurant Equipment?
The main difference between bakery equipment and restaurant equipment is that restaurant equipment focuses more on cooking food, like deck ovens. Meanwhile, bakery equipment includes tools that you use for preparing the ingredients, such as dough mixers and dough dividers. Then, there are tools like piping bags, cooling racks, and so on that are used once the baked goods are out of the oven.
Now For the Final Touches
With this essential bakery equipment list you can create a full proof plan and draw a budget. The equipment solutions that you purchase will determine how much you can make from your bakery business - get the best ones!