New Nelson bakery will cost $300,000

Press, Issue 32535, 19 February 1971, Page 17

New Nelson bakery will cost $300,000

(From Our Own Reporter) I NELSON, Feb. 18. A 17,000 sq. ft building recently sold by the Fletcher Timber Company, Ltd, in Bolt Road, Nelson, is to be converted into an up-to-date bakery. The firm, G. B. H. Bakeries, Ltd, proposes to spend about $300,000 on modernisation including an automatic processing and handling system. The company at present

has bakeries in Nelson city, Stoke (a Nelson suburb), Motueka and Blenheim, and they provide bread and small goods for the whole of the Nelson province and for most of Marlborough. The buildings, brought for an undisclosed price, comprise what was formerly the office block and joinery workshop of Fletcher Timber, which will end operations at the site on March 31. As well as the buildings, the company has bought from Fletchers two acres of land surrounding the plant. Much of this will be required for future expansion,

a car park, gardens and lawns.

The company does not take over the property until the end of September, but it hopes to be operating its new plant' in the buildings by March next year. FORCED TO MOVE The firm has had the move to the new premises forced upon it by the lack of room for expansion at both the Nelson and Stoke plants. The Nelson bakery is surrounded by industrial and business premises, and much of the Stoke bakery, which mainly produces small goods, will become a City Council car park. The company had been very fortunate in obtaining “an ideal building in an ideal locality,” the managing director of the firm, Mr P. Goodman. sa:d. The site was close to the development areas of Stoke and Richmond, and the building, a long one, was ideally suited to the automatic equipment that would be installed, he said.

Considerable alterations and improvements will have to be made to the buildings in Bolt Road to meet the required standards. The new plant will be the most modem available. Conventional mixers will be replaced by new, high-speed, dough-mixer developers, and the 50-tray, oil-fired oven, which can handle 1800 units an hour, will be completely automatic. So, too, will the 70-tray, steam-heated final proofer. Bagged flour will become a thing of the past with the installation of a 40-ton-capacity automatic bulk-flour plant. Although automation will to a great extent replace manual labour at the plant, the staff will not be greatly reduced, said Mr Goodman. “But they will become watchers, rather than doers,” he said. MOTUEKA BAKERY

The Motueka bakery is at present undergoing extensions and alterations valued at $15,000. The work will give better facilities for the packaging of bread and the baking of buns, rolls and other small goods. The Blenheim bakery, Marlborough Home Style Bakeries, Ltd, will continue to supply the Maryborough district.

The company expected to retain the shop frontage of the Stoke bakery and will probably dispose of the Nelson bakery, either by sale or lease, said Mr Goodman.

The picture shows the site of the new bakery project. The big building at left, owned by the Fletcher Timber Co., Ltd, contains what was the office block in front and the joinery workshop behind. The large building at the right, the property of Fletcher Merchants, Ltd, was vacated by the firm last year and is at present on lease to Griffins. It is being used as a store.