Content
Today we have the pleasure to interview Puratos, a platform dedicated to the world of pastry and bakery with more than 100 years of experience. Founded in Brussels more than 6 years ago, they support the Spanish market.
Puratos offers a complete experience to its customers; premium materials and services such as consulting for companies and small businesses. They help you improve and grow your business.
A few months ago we joined forces to create a collaborative box specially designed for the pastry arm. A sweet with history that Puratos wants to update to adapt to current trends and needs, take a look at our collaborative box Puratos by Selfpackaging!
Keep reading the interview to learn more about Puratos!
How did Puratos come about?
The history of our group goes back more than 100 years. It is situated in the fascinating and exciting world of bakers, confectioners and chocolatiers. Our company was born in this world, grew and found its raison d’être, which evolved into a passion.
Puratos was founded in Brussels, where our international headquarters are located, in 1919 by a certain Monsieur Groot to create, produce and sell raw materials for bakeries and pastry shops. Contrary to popular belief, the first Puratos products were not intended for bakers, but rather for confectioners and ice cream makers.
From them, and thanks to passion and investment in research and development, countless innovative products have helped improve the quality of the pastry, bakery and chocolate ranges of professionals around the world ever since.
In Spain, Puratos originated years later. Specifically on July 26, 1962 Juan Ehlis and his family together with Esteban Ruiz-Valls, decided to create T500 Ibérica. Six years later, the first factory in Sils (Girona, Spain), the current headquarters of our subsidiary, was set up. It was not until 1997 when the Puratos Group was created from the merger of Puratos and the Spanish subsidiary.
Today, the Puratos Group is present in more than 100 countries, with more than 9,300 passionate people shaping this project. passionate people who shape this project.
How would you define Puratos and what are its values?
Puratos is an international group offering a complete range of innovative ingredients and services for the bakery, confectionery and chocolate industry. We serve artisans, industrialists, supermarkets and food service companies in more than 100 countries around the world.
At Puratos, we believe that food has an extraordinary power in our lives. We don’t take this great responsibility lightly. That’s why our goal is to help customers succeed in their businesses by turning the technologies and experiences of food cultures around the world into new opportunities. Together, we advance the planet by creating innovative food solutions for the health and well-being of people around the world.
Six are the values that best define us:
- Collaboration is the way we choose to win. Great achievements are made when our teams work closely together, combining their diverse backgrounds, experiences and strengths.
- Courage means acting with confidence and optimism in the face of adversity. It drives us to explore new solutions, to innovate, to continuously improve. Courage allows us to take calculated risks in the pursuit of our vision.
- Quality is the standard by which we measure all our actions. Our ambition is to get it right the first time and always strive to learn and improve. Quality is everyone’s responsibility, so we aim to achieve the highest standards and continuously improve our performance.
- Passion is what inspires us. Passion for bread, pastry and chocolate, passion for our people, our culture, our customers, our communities, the planet and our results. Passion gives us a greater sense of purpose; it allows us to think long-term while delivering short-term results. Passion drives us to achieve what initially seemed impossible in order to please our customers.
- Integrity is our moral compass. Guided by moral and ethical principles, we treat people with respect, and our actions are always based on our values. We have zero tolerance for unethical behavior.
- Our Vision defines our future by building on our present. It links our strategy to our purpose, paving the way for our teams to execute with excellence. Vision allows us to dream big, face and overcome obstacles and set new ambitions.
In the world of bakery and confectionery, how important is packaging and social media.
Taste Tomorrow is the world’s largest study of bakery, confectionery and chocolate consumption trends, based on surveys of more than 18,000 consumers in 44 countries and in-depth interviews with foodies around the world.
It reveals the trends that will shape our market in the future:
The visual appearance of bakery, confectionery and chocolate products is one of the main purchase drivers. Products that are attractive to the eye are crucial to increase the intention to buy on the part of the consumer. This is directly linked to social networks. For some years now, it has been observed how in our sector, social networks are the perfect showcase to publicize master confectioners, bakers or chocolatiers and their works. As we usually say, consumers are looking for Instagram-worthy food that, in addition to being exquisite, they can show on their social networks and turn the act of eating into an experience.
View this post on Instagram
How do you work to be sustainable?
One of the major macro trends shown in the latest Taste Tomorrow study is precisely ethical lifestyle and sustainability. As a responsible food company, we consider ourselves agents of change and we have a roadmap for our commitments to today’s consumers and the next generations.
From an environmental point of view, we have a series of objectives set to reduce our impact on the planet as much as possible: achieving CO2 neutrality and water balance are some of them. As of today, 93% of our packaging is recyclable or reusable and we are working to reach 100%.
At the ingredient level, we always look for responsible sourcing. One example is our Cacao-Trace sustainable cocoa label. And in order to maintain the biodiversity of sourdoughs, we are the only company that owns a library of sourdoughs worldwide.
Health and Wellness are another of our sustainable pillars and are present from the products we manufacture to internal actions with our employees.
Finally, in the area of Local Communities, we collaborate with the Adsis Foundation to train young people at risk of exclusion in the profession of bakers or pastry chefs, and at the global level we have Bakery Schools with the same objective in the most disadvantaged areas.
Next steps; where are you headed?
Our goal is clear: we will continue to help customers succeed in their businesses by turning the technologies and experiences of food cultures around the world into new opportunities. Together, we advance the planet by creating innovative food solutions for the health and well-being of people everywhere.
You have already been able to get to know this group dedicated to innovation in the food sector a little better. Don’t forget to take a look at our collaborative box.