Special Touch Bakery

Holy Childhood’s Special Touch Bakery has grown into a successful non-profit business, employing intellectual and developmentally disabled adults who produce 16,000 hand-made pies annually out of the school’s 700sf kitchen. And it’s about to become a fully automated, commercial bakery.

Its new 20,000sf facility, built offsite in an existing industrial building, was designed by SWBR using efficiencies to help stretch the non-profit’s tight budget. Existing industrial infrastructure was tailored to meet the bakery’s needs, and new lighting added. Existing offices were refreshed, and a small café added to create a retail outlet. The plant floor was gutted to accommodate the commercial equipment and automated line. A ramp was added to the main entrance and accessibility controls to all employee entrances.

Special Touch Bakery will be able to produce a half million pies annually, creating 25 new jobs the first year alone. The bakery will partner with Palmer Food Services expanding distribution statewide and eventually nationwide, with proceeds continuing to help fund the school’s programming. The school also hopes the bakery becomes a business and workforce development model for other non-profits.