Kamloops bakeries navigating sugar supply strain, keeping shelves stocked

There have been moments of concern around whether they’d be able to have enough sugar for holiday treats, but the display cases at Brynn’s Bakery are filled and orders are going out as planned.

Co-owner and operator Brynn Hill says the holiday season is ordinarily a busy time and this year is no different.

“We do lots of Christmas cookies and bars, and we’ve been doing a holiday goodie box — so everything in that takes some type of sugar,” explains Hill. “We’ve been making a lot of cookie dough logs, so people slice and bake the logs. Even our Stollen, which is a German Christmas bread, it gets coated in sugar at the end. It’s nice that we have enough sugar to produce all of those items.”

The local shop was aware of the potential for short sugar supply, and apparently, so are customers.

“Lots of people when they’re ordering they’re just making sure, asking about the sugar, and that’s nice that they ask to make sure that we have enough to fill their orders,” adds Hill.

Harvest Moon Bakery has also made it through the pre-holiday season without much disruption to their production.

“We use about five or six different sugars here, so we’re a lot more easily able to plan — ‘Oh, if this one is going to be short, we’ll use more of this other one,'” explains co-owner Nicholas Driver. “We primarily use organic cane sugar here so that one isn’t as popular as some of the white refined sugars and such.”

Harvest Moon sources ingredients from within the region and says larger operations who rely solely on Lower Mainland suppliers will see more of an immediate impact, along with average consumers looking for a bag of sugar at the grocery store.

“Our supplier said as long as we’re not trying to stock up and hoard it, we’ll be alright,” says Driver.

“We’ve noticed just going to get groceries,” adds co-owner Christie Carnegie, “the sugar aisle is empty.”

Even for one of the largest of the Kamloops shops, brown sugar supplies have been a worry at times. But Craig’s Bakery and Deli has kept its shelves stocked in both its Kamloops and Chase locations, and continued to bake items for the grocery stores who sell their products.

Owner Craig Einfeld says his usual supplier didn’t have it, so he had to source the sugar in from elsewhere.

“All the years I’ve been involved, which is 50 years, I have never had one of my main suppliers not have brown sugar.”

For Craig’s, Einfeld says the supply-and-demand shifting has resulted in a sugar cost increase. He’s hoping the strike in Vancouver will be resolved and the sugar supply prices will ease up in the New Year.

“Because it’s a short term thing, I haven’t raised my prices. It’s not an easy thing to just go through your system and raise prices all over the place, so I’ve been taking that on the chin a little bit,” he explains, adding that if sugar prices continue to rise or aren’t brought back near-normal levels soon, it’ll mean the bakery prices will have to go up.

For now, Kamloops bakers will keep firing up the ovens and making sure there’s plenty of holiday treats, breads and other goods available.

by Dylana Kneeshaw

Kamloops bakeries navigating sugar supply strain, keeping shelves stocked

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