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In the
early 1990's J. Lyons owned or part owned
a string of bakeries across Europe from
Panrico in Spain, to operations in France,
Holland Germany and Spain
(Sapori)
And in
December 1991 I moved divisions to work
with Jim Hubner who was Director of J.
Lyons International. At that time with the
fall of the Iron Curtain the group was
looking at all points East, and had
already established a John Bull pub and a
Baskins Robbins ice cream parlour in St
Petersburg, on Nevsky Prospekt, (the main
drag), with a huge Ice Cream factory under
construction in Moscow. So there was some
prior knowledge of the city and
possibilities of property
acquisition.
Projects
of this nature were supported by the
Foreign offices 'know how' fund which
subsidised travelling costs and training
expenses
Our joint
venture partner was the Kirov (re named
Samson) Meat Company, who operated a huge
meat processing plant on the city
outskirts complete with its rail sidings,
flocks of birds picking over the
carcasses, and horse drawn open wagons
-like stepping back to the middle ages!
Within this complex was a butchers
training school which met the labour
requirements of a huge area around the
city, but with the break up of communism
and of central funding this building
became vacant.
The
objective of the Peter-Al venture was to
set up a central bakery, with around 4
cafeteria style restaurants in areas of
high people throughput, like the huge
suburb dormitory high rise blocks which
were largely built without any shop
infrastructure.
We planned
to manufacture a range of products
unfamiliar to the Russians; This was to
fill a perceived gap in the lunch break
market: Filled baguettes, and rolls,
Eccles cakes, jam and 'cream' doughnuts;
sausage rolls, and croissants all
displayed in a similar manner to the Oven
Door Group of Coffee Shops in the UK ran
by the DCA subsidiary. This involved
sourcing in the UK flat wicker baskets,
wire trays, shelving systems, fast cycles
dish washers, and self service servery
counters with heated and refrigerated
sections, soup kettles, cash tills and
studies of seating units, steel and pine
wood construction that we planned to make
locally.
For the
bakery we needed a large range of small
scale equipment; 15 tray capacity ovens,
High speed mixers, Dough divider/moulders,
pastry rolling and cutting equipment,
proffers, doughnut fryers, baking trays,
stainless tables and wheels racked -to be
made locally; I scoured the large second
hand market in the UK for reconditioned
machinery and gradually we purchased
everything and stored it in
Greenford.
A Russian
Director -General was recruited and other
management for accounting, production and
technical were added to the team. A Ford
Transit was purchased and some of the
seats removed for the locals to use to run
us around, and move raw materials. Our
technologist-was Ken Sydney formally
Production Director of Hales Cakes but
very much a hands on baker when required.
He checked on the local ingredients to
match our requirements and over several
visits built up a working relationship
with a typical Russian balabusta who ran a
small development unit in the meat
factory.
Meanwhile,
over a period of 2 years I made visits of
about a weeks duration every 6 weeks or
so. We searched for the shop outlets and
eventually we found one in an outer suburb
called somewhat peculiarly- 'Avant Garde'
on the ground floor of a 15 story complex
of flats. The project was explained to the
Manageress and she was enthousiatic.This
was a bread shop already with a van
delivery dock, and a series of small rooms
plus a larger shop front area we could
seat around 40. The seats were to follow
the Oven Door design and be relatively
uncomfortable to ensure no one stayed too
long!; I drew up the steel frame and also
the design for the bakery rack and passed
these to Sergie to find suitable
fabricator. On a subsequent visit I was
taken to Peter the Great Ship yard, where
after security calls we were allowed past
the entry building and had a long walk
along the bank of the River Neva to a
fabrication workshop; This was a badly lit
fume filled workspace, but they had
successfully bent cut and welded steel
tube into the seating frame and made the
first few racks; castors were another
matter; The Soviets did not have
supermarket trolleys and steel castors
with nylon tyres were unknown locally and
had to be imported. I also went to a wood
working concern offices; to the main St
Peterburg lighting factory to source the
lights for the shops and to a china
factory
In
parallel with the search for the shop-cafe
premises the development of the factory
commenced; After the building was surveyed
and the floor plans produced, we did the
plans for equipment installation; Yeast
raised goods had to isolated, the fat
fryers needed fumes extraction canopies,
and the dust from sieving the bagged flour
had to be contained with extraction
equipment. Meetings with Sanson's building
department were held and with their local
architects; All this was incredible
laborious and everything was discussed via
an interpreter, Elena, who could speak
virtually simultaneously or Julia who was
nearly as proficient. Additionally all the
elements of Soviet style burocracy were
still in place; The mayors office; the
Health department; and the City Planning
department besides all the queries from
Sanson management themselves had to be
met; In the bakery we wanted to put some
production equipment on one floor, while
on the immediate floor above were existing
toilets etc which were to be modernised;
For reasons we could never illicit this
was not permitted-it was against the
norm-the rule book.
When we
met senior Sanson management-our Jt
Venture partners we would wait in an anti
room, before being asked to the inner
sanctum; A dour office, lined with cheap
wood chip panels, basic chairs, glass
fronted booked case, and the Director
behind a desk with 4 phones on it; At that
time Leningrad as it was still named had
no western phone technology; They needed
one phone for the factory internally; one
for the city and one for calls outside the
city- the fourth maybe was for the
Kremlin!
Eventually
we got to the stage that we had to test
local ingredients while the building was
converted, the plans having been virtually
accepted. To make product tests we needed
around 4 keys items of equipment, and it
was very uneconomic to send these out, so
a decision was made to load a complete
40ft trunker and send out everything we
had ready in Greenford; The truck was
booked; paper work prepared and checked
and rechecked; On the appointed day the
truck arrived -with a sense of humour; Its
number plate was HI KGB.
On a
subsequent visit we inspected the
machinery now stored in a corrugated steel
warehouse distant in the site; The access
was terrible; no proper metalled road-just
rough tracks, but there appeared to be no
significant damage. It was only when later
the trials began and the Prover would not
operate correctly that the poor handling
became apparent.
The
changes we needed to the building were
considerable; Pallets of bagged flour were
to be stored on the top floor in the 3
story building, relying on the durability
of the lift; and a goods-in dock was to be
created; All the ventilation and fume and
dust extract ducting had to be put in and
walls built and walls tiled and the floor
made good, plus all the staff facilities
created.
By now
about 2 years had elapsed and on a
progress trip we visited the building and
found that the floors were being removed
-they had wonderful oak beams let into the
half meter think walls, and were being
replaced with 6 inch RSJ's and thin
concrete pallets topped with shingle and
cement; Russian technology did not run to
pumping concrete as we would have done; It
was all wood scaffolding, wheel barrows,
labour intensive, very slow and of poor
quality finish; (When Allied converted
their shop to the John Bull pub they
loaded a trailer with a completed
prefabricated system, to line the wall,
seating modules, bar and equipment and 2
weeks later is was done-we did not have
that possibility).
We had not
been told that they would strip out all
the floors and add considerable to the
building time scale; There were other
obstacles to progress and Lyons management
became increasingly frustrated. Also we
still had only the one shop/cafe outlet in
spite of considering at least 6 other
premises. So even though 'Avant Garde' was
transferred to the ownership of Peter-Al
-our one triumph over bureaucracy - the
project was abandoned during 1993, giving
them a present of equipment.
In Easter
1994 I returned with my wife as a tourist
for a few days, and was met by Julia and
the Transit Van! We enjoyed the sights of
this wonderful city, and visited the
bakery building. The builders had left and
the Director Sergie showed me the
embryonic bakery-they were making 3000
bread rolls a day and assembling them into
In Flight meals trays for Aeroflot; So in
the end our efforts were not all in vane
and we left behind a little western
goodwill and technology.
It was a
fascinating time to see St Petersburg; I
said then to my friends that it would take
a generation for Russia to bring its
standard of living up to that of the West,
and friends who have been there since do
not disagree. If you want a bracing visit
go in January when it is -22deg C.
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