It's Going to Go Big

Written by Jill Ritchot, Intern for TWB

In November 2017, I finalized plans to volunteer with The Women’s Bakery in Rwanda. My excitement was palpable. As part of the MovingWorlds Institute fellowship program that had begun in June, I had spent months looking for the right project fit. Suddenly everything had fallen into place; an impactful opportunity to work with and for women, join an engaged and dynamic team, and offer my communications and marketing skills.

I exhaled a deep sigh of relief and felt the eagerness and nervousness begin to bubble up as I thought about what the next few months would bring. I was intrigued by the organization’s mission, had spoken to Heather and Meg, and wanted to learn more. As my departure date approached, I couldn’t wait to see, how is bread powerful?

I stepped off the plane in Kigali at the end of January to begin my three-month project, aiming to create a communications and marketing strategy for the new flagship café. I felt inspired to be jumping in at such an exciting time as the bakery and office moved to the new flagship location and café renovations began. In my first discussions with Meg and Fran on arrival, I quickly saw that it was a fast-paced and lively environment with a diverse, adaptable, and passionate team.

I started by meeting with team members to learn more about who they see as The Women’s Bakery’s customers and what they see as the future of the organization. I was immediately moved by what I heard, “the future is bright”; “it’s going to go big”; “our bread is for everyone”; “when I started, I was teaching the women, now they are teaching me”. I felt fueled to keep digging in and learning more about The Women’s Bakery and our customers.

Together, Fran, Rachel and I conducted market research at three bakery locations.

We began by talking to the people who know our customers best – the women who bake and sell The Women’s Bakery bread every day.  I quickly learned how varied the customers were from location to location and the key differences between what Rwandans and expats look for when buying bread. We continued to build on the team’s and women’s knowledge by doing interviews, surveys, and focus groups with current and potential future customers to explore more. What we discovered is that while there is a lot of diversity in who buys The Women’s Bakery bread, there are also some clear uniting preferences: taste, nutrition, and freshness. That, and much more, is exactly what The Women’s Bakery offers.

I got the chance to see how the women bake the delicious, nutritious and fresh bread every day when I joined the team in the kitchen to learn how to make it. The women’s expertise and confidence in what they do and their patience as they taught us was inspiring. Although we don’t all speak the same language, the joy, laughter, and strength in the kitchen that day both humbled and invigorated me.  It is not just bread rising in the bakery; it is community and empowerment.

As I come towards the end of my time with The Women’s Bakery and armed with our growing customer knowledge, I am working on a variety of marketing tools and strategies with Fran to get the message out. Loud. We are strong women baking bread. Our bread is packed with vitamins, nutrients, and protein.  And in my time in Kigali, I have seen that a loaf of bread truly can inspire, nourish communities, and spark economies.

Now that’s bread power.

From Scratch: Our Flagship Story

Building something from scratch—now there’s a concept we know well at The Women’s Bakery. From our founders who built our Bakery in A Box model from the ground up, to the women in each of our bakery locations around East Africa that bake highly nutritious bread from locally sourced ingredients: we build things from scratch daily. It’s part of our culture: we push, strive, overcome and accomplish in order to further our mission of empowering women through business and education.

We are strong women baking bread... and building financial models, breaking into new markets, recipe testing, operating, organizing, and training. The list is endless.

Our most recent building project, quite literally, has been our effort to create a new Flagship Bakery: a space to propel our brand, display the ultimate success of our model, and sell nutritious bread. The Women’s Bakery Flagship is an inviting environment for Kigali, Rwanda customers to enjoy, interact and collaborate in while learning about and supporting our social enterprise model. It’s a space with higher production capacity to meet growing market demands, a hub for TWB product and marketing innovation, a centralized training center for future TWB programs, a single office location for cohesion as a bakery and organization.

It’s a model for TWB bakeries everywhere.

Building something from scratch takes work. It takes grit. It takes passion and endurance. But those are things that the staff at The Women’s Bakery embodies well. It has been an inspiration to see everyone put their hands to the challenging task of doing something we’ve never done before. But we’re doing it. We’re building it up from scratch: design, processes, systems, products. And it’s going to be AWESOME. It’s going to showcase #breadpower and we cannot wait to share it with you.

Coming soon, The Women’s Bakery Flagship.

Twists That Make Change

“Pretals, pretals!”

That’s what the women in Remera call them: the pretzels.

This strange and new product that has opened so many doors and pushed us further down the road towards profitability was foreign to the women at our Kigali bakery just a few months ago. Now, they are experts at crafting and baking this special offering.

At The Women’s Bakery, we know that our bread is more than just a food product. It is a livelihood. It represents empowerment, it can bring change. Every muffin, honey tresse, and loaf of sweet potato bread adds to a movement of strong women baking bread. These strong women baking at Remera now have a new product: pretzels. As our highest profit margin product, these pretzels are popping up in cafes and businesses all over Kigali. They have become a vehicle through which the city is learning more about #breadpower. Even private clients are clamoring to get our pretzels at their house party, office meeting, or public event.

And, the women of Remera bakery are seeing the impact their bread can have in a whole new way.

I have had the privilege of being part of testing the recipe, training the women and now bringing this unique product to market. It has been incredible to watch. We have orders daily for this special piece of bread that is continuing TWB’s goal of creating sustainable jobs and enabling profitable bakeries. These twisty bits of salt, herb or cinnamon sugar goodness are not only delicious, they are powerful and they are just one part of the exciting operations that are paving our path for continued success.

Meet Francoise!

This year, TWB is aiming to focus on our existing bakeries and refine our process for optimal efficiency and production so TWB women can manage their bakeries and be profitable. As part of this focus, our Remera Bakery (in Kigali) is seeking new markets and customers for our bread products.

Francoise Umutoniwase, our new marketing intern, has joined our team in Kigali to lead these efforts. This week, we sat down with Francoise to learn more about her education, interests, and what excites her most about working with The Women’s Bakery.

TWB: How did you hear about The Women’s Bakery?

Francoise: I heard about The Women’s Bakery on Instagram. I saw the photos and knew I wanted to be involved. I looked up the website and reached out to learn more. I was already interested in baking but also the kind of work that used baking for business and women’s empowerment.

TWB: Have you had a lot of experience baking?

Francoise: Of course! I have made amandazi and cookies at home with my family. I’m very close with them. We bake together but also travel together – I have two brothers and two sisters and we have a lot of fun together. I’m excited to get more experience inside the bakery at TWB. My favorite product is the vanilla cake, they are so sweet and delicious, but I also have been enjoying the oatmeal cookies.

TWB: Tell us more about your educational background and what your dreams are for the future.

Francoise: I studied history and economics in secondary school because I was always interested in these topics. At the Adventist University of Central Africa, I chose marketing because I love expressing what you have and sharing it with other people. Marketing ties to so many other things that I want to do. Eventually, I would love to have a big hotel with a huge cafeteria with all kinds of healthful products. That’s of course in 10-15 years. With TWB, I hope that the women will become stars throughout Rwanda. They will be able to grow their market and be known everywhere.

TWB: So far in your internship, what have you enjoyed most? What has been challenging? What is the potential of TWB in Rwanda – and beyond?

Francoise: Well, I like working with people who like to bake. Specifically, I like exploring markets for bread because you can learn about consumer behavior and habits. With TWB, I can apply what I’ve learned in school in a very tangible way. This of course, has been hard. We use low amounts of sugar and the fact that we have such a nutritious product can be hard to convince people to consume. I think TWB is a great opportunity to promote love between all people and to practice patience as we work for the business to be successful. Profits may not come immediately, but they will come. I also hope we can continue to create goals with the TWB women so they can actively be growing and seeking more success.

TWB: We are so happy you have joined our team. All of us on the team have had impactful people in our life that have propelled us to do this kind of work. Who are your biggest role models? Who motivates you the most?

Francoise: There are three: my parents, Oprah, and my boyfriend. My parents pursue all opportunities; Oprah is motivated and has hope; and my boyfriend is generous with others. His dream is to help street children and I find this so encouraging.

TWB: Thanks for all your hard work, Francoise. We can’t wait to see how your work helps us grow in Kigali – and elsewhere!

Francoise: Thank you to all of you. Everyone at TWB, you are my superheroes. You guys are just, really cool. I hope that my experience with TWB continues.

So, Tell Me More

Last week, two TWB staff and Global Health Corps (GHC) alums, Aime and Meg, attended an East Africa GHC leadership summit in Nyamata, Rwanda to reconnect and share experiences with other co-fellows and staff from different parts of the world.

It was an opportunity for alums to share their achievements since they completed the GHC program. In doing so, everyone had to introduce themselves, where they were placed, their role during their fellowship year and what they are doing after the fellowship. 

When I (Aime) said that I work at The Women’s Bakery, another GHC alum approached me and said, “You work with The Women’s Bakery, so tell me more.”

This is a great inquiry that I always like to answer. It is an opportunity to showcase the uniqueness of The Women’s Bakery and what drives us in what we do.  We are promoting nutrition education, health and business education and above all we are availing locally sourced, nutritious and affordable breads.

This fellow continued, “So tell me more, how do you measure the impact?” 

An even greater question!

From the baseline surveys taken before training begins we learned that our trainee women/men couldn’t afford the health insurance coverage for the whole family or could only afford to cover the family members most vulnerable to sicknesses, like kids or pregnant mothers.

But, from our follow-up surveys taken 6 months after the conclusion of training, we can see that the training graduates who chose to work in bakeries are able to cover their health insurance, send kids to school and cover the basic needs.

That’s the impact.

“There is more to tell, come learn the Power of Bread!”