Wholesale bread: planning quantities and storage
A guide for cafés, hotels and shops — how to estimate how much bread you need and how to store it before service.
A wholesale partnership with Pan Pan doesn’t end when the bread reaches your venue — that’s where it begins. How you receive, store and serve the bread decides whether guests experience it as fresh as they would in our own shops, or something weaker. Here’s what we focus on when advising partners on planning their supply.
Estimating quantity
The most common mistake isn’t ordering too little or too much on a given day — it’s an order that swings day to day with no pattern. A fixed daily or weekly order, based on your average volume, is a far more reliable foundation for good supply than a last-minute decision. Look back over a few weeks and work out which days bring more guests, then set a fixed base quantity for each day, with room for occasional adjustment rather than constant improvising. A hotel with a steady breakfast count will have a different pattern from a café with a strong weekend rush — which is exactly why quantities are always agreed individually, based on your profile.
Receiving and storing at the venue
When bread arrives at your venue, treat it with the same care we give it in our own shops. Thick-crusted bread, like White Sourdough or Whole Wheat Sourdough, should sit at room temperature, covered with a cloth or in a paper bag, not sealed in plastic — plastic traps moisture and softens the crust sooner than it should. Baguette and Ciabatta, with a thinner crust, are best on the day they arrive; if you’re planning to offer them the next day too, freezing is a more reliable option than leaving them at room temperature for more than a day or two.
Refreshing before service
Some of the bread and pastry will need a short return to heat before it reaches the guest, especially if it’s been stored from the day before or pulled from the freezer. A short warm-up in the oven brings the crust’s crispness back far better than a toaster or microwave, and the same goes for butter-laminated pastry, which should never sit in the fridge. It’s worth setting a fixed routine for this in your kitchen or at the counter, rather than improvising each morning.
Why a fixed order wins
A fixed, regular order means fewer surprises for both of us — we know how much to bake, and you know what to expect and how to plan your storage. That’s the difference between a supply that feels like chance and one that feels like a process.
If you run a café, hotel or shop and are considering a regular wholesale partnership, the best next step is a direct conversation with the Pan Pan team to match the plan to your rhythm.