Andreas and Sarah Apostolopoulos - Harris Hearth Breads Microbakery

0:04 Churchill said, those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it. Kevin Hallinan believes that certainly applies to business. Welcome to Winning Business Radio here at W4CY Radio. That's W4CY. com. And now, your host, Kevin Hallinan. Thanks, everyone, for joining in again today. I am Kevin Hallinan, and welcome back to Winning Business TV and Radio. On W4CY. com, we are streaming live on Talk4TV. com. In addition to Facebook, and that's at Winning Business Radio, we're also live, well, sorry, we'll also be available on the podcast after the live show on whatever platform you like to consume your content from, and that's YouTube, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple. Again, the list goes on. The mission of Winning Business Radio and TV, as regular viewers and listeners know, is to offer insights, and advice to help people avoid the mistakes of others, to learn best practices, the how-tos, the what-tos, the what-not-tos, to be challenged and hopefully to be inspired by the successes of others.

1:14 Who are those others? They're consultants, coaches, advisors, authors, founders and owners, entrepreneurs, people with expertise and experience. But you know, virtually every successful person that I've ever had a chance to talk to has had some form of failure in their lives and careers. I say this every week. While we all have to get our knees skinned once in a while, I'm driven to keep those scrapes from needing major surgery. Let's endeavor to learn from history so we don't repeat it. I've spent the better part of my career equipping businesses to grow from solopreneurs to small and medium-sized companies all the way to the Fortune 50. I've seen some of those companies win and to varying degrees, I've seen some of them fail. I've had the opportunity to rub elbows with some of the highest performing people around and with some who probably should have found other professions. In my own businesses, I've had lots of success, but some failures too. So I like to think I've learned a lot from those experiences.

2:06 So yeah, you're going to hear from me, but I mostly want you to hear from our guests. And today, my guests are Andreas and Sarah Apostolopoulos. Listen, here's their bio. Bread is not something Harris Hearth simply makes and sells. It's a labor of love that Andreas Apostolopoulos practices at the oven and something he and his wife, Sarah, have built together. Fittingly founded on February 14, 2024, Harris Hearth is an Acton, Massachusetts-based micro bakery devoted to naturally leavened bread, regenerative organic grain, and the time it takes to do things properly. The idea began with Andreas baking and sharing bread with neighbors. That eventually turned into an informal bread club in 2023. Inspired by the response, they took Andreas' passion for baking into something's something customers could actually buy.

2:59 Andreas bakes. He approaches bread with equal parts curiosity, discipline, and respect. Hello, respect for the process. His connection to food and bread dates back to his childhood in Greece. We're going to hear about that. Andreas speaks Italian and has studied with Italian master Panettone bakers and has visited Italy many times. One of his biggest bakery inspirations is Forno Brisa in Bologna. His interest in sourdough became much more serious in 2020 during the pandemic when he began digging into the variables that determine whether naturally fermented bread succeeds or fails. Sarah developed the. Packaging and labeling while managing the day-to-day business. As an owner, Sarah's been part of the business from its beginning in the couple's Acton home. She runs the customer-facing, customer experience side of the bakery, including Harris Hearth's packaging and labeling, as you heard, as well as stock and inventory. She also oversees the farmer's market presence and handles the legal and financial side of the business. Her professional background in legal services and executive support requires organization, attention to detail, and the ability to manage many moving pieces at once, and those skills translate naturally to the company. Harris Hearth, they live on Harris Street in a home built in 1769 by John Harris, was an Acton Minuteman who fought under Isaac Davis at the Battle of Concord That's where you may recall from history the shot heard around the world.

4:27 They use locally grown and locally milled regenerative organic grain for their everyday breads. Select products, including panettone and certain focaccia, use premium glyphosate-free imported Italian grain. Whole grains are often milled fresh, and Harris Hearth's naturally leavened breads ferment for 24 hours or more. Together, Andreas and Sarah... have built clearly defined but complimentary roles. He bakes, she keeps, everything around the baking moving. And together, they continue to build Harris Hearth without sacrificing the process that made the business possible in the first place. Andreas and Sarah, welcome to Winning Business Radio and TV.

5:08 And thanks for being here. Hey, thanks for having us. Yeah, thanks. You're welcome. So first, tell us about your backgrounds. Do you have kids, pets? No kids yet. Maybe Sarah can talk about our cats. Okay. We have a bonded pair of rescue cats, uh, unofficial bakery mascots, um, that don't appreciate being locked out of the kitchen, but they have, um, but yeah. No, we've we're, we're starting our little family with some cats. That's really nice. So Andres, I know you grew up in Greece. Tell us about the city or town and what it was like to grow up there.

5:48 Well, not exactly. I, uh, my dad was born in Greece, so I'm like first, first generation, I guess is the word for that. So yeah, my, my dad was born, um, in, uh, outside of a small, outside of a small city, about three hours North of Athens. Um, and so pretty, pretty small agricultural village, I guess, uh, would you call it? Cool. And we spent most of our summers going back there for one to two months of summer. Um, And so, you know, in aggregate, it was quite a bit of time when you add it up over like 20 years, you know, like going at one year. And you speak Greek and Italian. Yeah, I speak Greek fluently. And I got into learning Italian just in college to to kind of engage some of my passions around the food and the culture and just recognizing sort of a very common thread with the Greek culture in a way.

6:35 That's cool. So why did you choose to get your undergrad in civil engineering and why City College of New York? Well, I mean, I grew up in New York City. That's like a natural place. A lot of immigrants from Greece landed. And my dad was an engineer as well. So, you know, I was obviously always, I think, always attracted to the math, math and sciences growing up. And yeah. Having my dad as an engineer was kind of an inspiration, but I decided to assert a little bit of independence and go into civil structural engineering as opposed to my dad's mechanical engineering background, which he strongly urged me against doing, but whatever. But yeah, it was just always a passion of mine and still is seeing infrastructure come to life, even though I'm no longer in that field exactly.

7:25 Sarah, you grew up where and what was it like to grow up there? I'm from. probably one of the snowiest cities on the great lakes, Erie, Pennsylvania, um, behind Buffalo, at least, uh, I grew up and I am an only child, but I very much enjoy that. Um, I grew up with my Italian grandparents living next door. Uh, so I was always exposed to, you know, good food and culture and great music and everything. Um, and I, I enjoyed coming from a small town and, uh, you know, only actually recently moving about eight years. Ago to Massachusetts. Um, so it's, it's, it was good and, uh, came from a close knit, you know, very strong moral driven family, which I'm very, very grateful. I had, um, very, you know, great influential parents and grandparents. Um, and with my grand Italian grandparents being next.

8:25 Door, there was always bread around. So I guess this, that's a, it's a good fit. Um, Ours wasn't. She was in Connecticut. We were in Massachusetts. But yeah, a lot of bread, a lot of really good baking and food. And my mother and my grandmother were great. Great cooks. So we learned a lot. They taught us a lot. So how did you guys make it to Massachusetts and how did you meet? Well, we yeah, we met in Pennsylvania while I was working for General Electric out there. And so after college, you know. uh decided to take an opportunity with the fortune 500 company because uh ed got in as an intern and um you know kind of sort of left civil engineering behind at that point not knowing not knowingly so but you know entered the train world the locomotives uh being built out there and yeah we met a couple years into my into my time there and then uh that job didn't last that long well it lasted long enough but it didn't last that much longer and we were already together for like a year And I started looking for work and found something out this way, not because I was specifically looking to come back to Northeast, honestly.

9:30 We've been okay with something else. But, yeah, we met online, actually, during my time there. Very cool. Once the job materialized out here, she soon followed me out here. We haven't looked back since. It's been great. Yeah, online relationships or online, you know, connections and dating has really changed. Yeah. We never did it back in my day, but because it was on there, but I don't know if I'd like it. Now it has a, positive effect. It works. Yeah, it works. There's times where it works great and there's other times where, you know, it can really be frustrating, but it works for us. So, Sarah, you work at a company called Somos. Tell us about, as a legal specialist, that's your background. Tell us about the company a little bit and your work.

10:11 Uh, so most it not to be confused with Sonos, which is everybody thinks I can get them free speakers, which I can't. Um, we, so most is the North American numbering plan administrator. Uh, so we manage all 42 million or so toll free numbers. In North America. Um, I work in the legal department. I do a lot of contract work and contract management, um, under the general counsel and the associate general counsel. And I, um, really, really enjoy it. I started off as an executive. Assistant to the CAO and general counsel and started getting more involved in the legal side of things and contract work.

10:53 And a few years after I had started, I kind of got moved into that position and I've, I've loved it. I've learned so much and I think it's a great fit for my personality. What's been the biggest challenge for you? I'll ask you both this, but first, Sarah, of managing a full-time job and a full-time passion. Uh, we don't have a lot of free time. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, I, I guess I joke. We mostly run like, we mostly like to think of it as like our, our night, you know, like, you know, I used to have like night and weekend. It's our nights and weekends job. Yeah. So, so either it's a, you know, a 5.00 AM thing or it's a 7.00 PM thing or, or it's, you know, pretty much the entire weekend during the high season. Um, so it's challenging, but, um, we like to say that we, you know, we get, we've gotten a lot of, uh, you know, experience really just trying to maximize our time and, and, uh, allocate it to things that we enjoy.

11:48 So do you both work or does either of you work remotely at all? So there's no commute on those days or are you mostly in the office? I'm a hundred percent remote. Yeah. I commute sometimes not too far away, but, um, but yeah, it's, uh, I mean, obviously having some of that time does help, but, um, yeah, we, we really, you know, the secret to any sourdough is, bread business or otherwise is really just schedule and understanding your fermentation and all that. And if you can get that right, you can make it work with any schedule. Yeah, I was going to ask. We're going to get there. But tell us about Leonardo DRS and your role as senior program manager. Yeah, I've been a program manager for a bit, kind of like the first time that I left engineering. Um, it's, it's not too different from, from being a business owner.

12:35 You treat all the projects you have as, as, as your business and you look to see their financials and succeed and their customers be happy. So I, I like to think in a way that the, that the, this experience here, just with nights and weekends kind of running a business is, is almost a help to my overall experience and ability to like understand how business really works. and put those kind of learnings to work. You know, because you really feel it when you're the one doing all the roles. You really feel what that means. You can bring that same feeling to your day job, too. So, yeah. Well, we do propulsion work, basically. Propulsion, okay.

13:16 Defense-related. Yeah. Yeah. Anything more, Sarah, and then people in dark suits will be coming for us, right? Yeah. All right. So you started as a book club. Tell us about that. I'm book club club, right? A passion that you recognized people really enjoyed too. So talk about that. And then when you actually decided and why you actually decided to make it a business. Yeah, that, um, yeah, that's always an interesting one to try and answer because it feels like it happened like sort of all at once or, or, or just, you know, without really like a passive decision. But but yeah, it was it was 2023, I think, you know, before we had really launched anything, maybe fall, maybe summer, you know, when I would go when I would start, you know, making bread. I've been doing that for like six, seven years now. But but I was starting to try and scale up a little bit and say, like, well, you know, it's almost the same amount of work. Let me make five loaves. Let me make 10 loaves. Um, just to, just to get the experience in reality, it's really a, you can't solve for all the variables that are involved in this, unless you really number one, make a lot, but number two, make it often. So it's like just a, just a practice of like scoring a loaf of bread.

14:34 If you only have two and you know that you'll go through those in a week and a half, and then you'll make bread again, you know, next month or like in two weeks. Uh, your next opportunity to test, maybe you scored it incorrectly the first time is in like two weeks. So then you forgot what you did the first time, unless you take copious notes and you really don't have the, you know, the, the muscle memory of anything. So, um, so yeah, so we, we were basically saying, all right, let's try to do this a little more often, but heck, what are we going to do with all this bread? I mean, we love it and all that. Yeah. Like it's, it's healthy and all and everything else, but you know, there's obviously too much to eat. So, um, donation came to mind and other things, you know, just sharing with neighbors. And we basically started it that way. I don't want to oversell it or anything. We just, we just really had a neighbors that live here on Harris street that, uh, we're happy to support, um, you know, cost-free kind of thing. And maybe, maybe a couple of were purchased, you know, towards as we got closer to opening the business, but yeah, we tried to distribute bread to, to locals and get some feedback. And yeah, In between that and going like into the business, you know, I was also seeing that this was a trend that was spreading across the U.S., primarily from the West Coast, where bread is more where sourdough bread is more popular. And so I saw the means that that micro bakeries were using to succeed ovens and this and that and how they were using a platform called Hot Plate, which is like meant for home bakers to sell their products. So I started, you know, the level of risk or the barrier to entry started reducing in my mind. Like, OK, I pretty much don't have to go make a website, which I'm an engineer, but I don't know how to do.

16:02 I don't want to do. And like, OK, I could kind of do it in my home oven. I don't need I don't have a major barrier or investment to get started. And so and I said, OK, I'm going to need some tubs and some implements and some tools, maybe put a thousand, put a couple grand into it. So, you know, some small seed money. And I have people that are interested. So I kind of thought, all right, this is pretty low risk. Let me get a logo. Let me put something together. And, you know, we spent some time going back and forth about a business name, trying to make it historical and all that. But in reality, I would say the biggest motivators were what I just said, like wanting to make bread more often, not have it just without a home to be able to practice the craft. You really have to do a lot of it. And so it was meant really as a as a learning exercise.

16:45 And on the other hand, maybe with some some small hope that it would get even bigger, but with no realization of what that would mean. If it got bigger, what would that mean? Oh, my gosh, this oven's not big enough. Like we need this other thing. It's going to take over the house. None of that was understood at that time. All right. Let's take our first break right here. We'll be back in about 60 seconds with Andreas and Sarah. You're listening to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Hallinan on W4CY Radio. That's W4CY. com. Don't go away. More helpful information is coming right up right here on Winning Business Radio.

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18:50 Here once again is Kevin Hallinan. We are back with Andreas and Sarah Apostolopoulos of Harris Hearth. So I'm going to read this really quickly. Started with the grain, perfected by process. You use 100 percent regenerative organic grain that's locally grown, locally milled. The exception is select focaccia and panettone. I can say those words, but the glyphosate or glyphosate. Oh, yeah. So tell us what those terms are. Regenerative organic grain and glyphosate free. Yeah. So so we like to really kind of. you know, distinguish what we do at Harris-Arts Breaks. I mean, there's a lot of places you can buy your bread. There are even some competitors that we've got in the area since we started. But, you know, regenerative organic really means it's going one step beyond just organic and kind of, you of using the right farming practices that don't add chemicals or sprays or treatments to the grain. Going one step beyond that is basically taking care of the land itself that's growing the grain. And that means that you're basically treating the crop in a regenerative fashion. That means it can regenerate year after year. And it really refers to like rotating crops and not maximizing yield and planting cover crops and intermittent crops between wheat. So you're obviously

20:23 not going to get the most out of a plot of land that way. What most conventional agriculture is, is just like, you know, you're planting the same wheat on the same plot year after year after year, and you're blasting it with all sorts of pesticides and all sorts of fertilizers. This is a more natural approach where you're rotating the land use and you're really... Taking care of the land in the sense that you're making sure nutrients are returning to the earth that can then be taken up by the crop or the grain, in this case, that you're growing. So glyphosate is one of those sprays that actually is used quite frequently on wheat. It's a commercial roundup. Yeah, it's basically roundup. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah.

21:03 So what happens with wheat is that in many parts of the country or many parts of the world, it can't dry out naturally enough. And actually these sprays are used to help the product dry out because you want wheat to be dry when you're picking it. Otherwise it can go bad more quickly. But however, if you're drying it, you're applying it at the very end of the process. So it's very likely at that point to end up in your food. And this is a primary reason why so many people say, oh, I'm allergic to gluten or I've got issues with bread in this country. A lot of it ties down to that. And so we try to really be very clear about where our flour is coming from, how it's grown, and what it's grown with. And that's why we distinguish with the regenerative organic grain.

21:48 And even when we are importing grain from elsewhere, because we do believe in local first, We, you know, we're bringing it from places where people, I mean, generally here have a high respect for their grain culture and for their food culture in Europe. In general, they have higher standards than we do. But that Italian grain is also certified to be without any of that, which is fairly common there. But just to say that when we are using grains from elsewhere that aren't, what we uh what we you know 100 local let's say uh we're still applying those same standards and um and really looking for technical flowers that perform well for very specific applications yeah. It's interesting i found out i was celiac uh about six or seven years ago and i grew up as we're talking to sarah i grew up in an italian house my mom is foods and pasta and yeah Crazy, right?

22:38 So that's a true celiac. Did you have issues with grain just growing up all those years, too? Well, I didn't know it. I had symptoms off and on. I had times when I couldn't even eat, and then it would go away for years, and then another time, and it would go away, and then another time, go away. Like breads like ours that are fermentation-driven and organic and... sourdough because they, I mean, you know, celiac is a, is a genetic thing, right? Yeah. If, yeah, if you're truly see, I. I, you described it as off and on. So I wonder, well, no, now it's anytime if I get even because I've had it on my system for so long anyway, if I get even a little bit of gluten, it's a problem. Yeah.

23:22 Gotcha. I get that a lot with the farmer's markets and like public events, people be. Like, Oh, I can't eat weed. And my first question knowing about celiac because my mom has it, um. And I've been tested for it. Luckily, I don't think that would be real. I know. Is, you know, are you celiac? And usually if people are, I'm like, oh, OK, I totally get it. Please move away. Please stay alive. Yeah. But what Andreas was kind of alluding to is if, you know, you have Crohn's, IBS, digestive sense, you know, sensitivity, you know, who knows? A lot of times, you know, obviously working in legal, I'm always like, please eat at your own risk.

24:03 I don't want to kill anyone. Right. But we've had really good luck with people being. Able to eat our sourdough because of the quality of the regenerative organic grains that we use and the fact that it is fermented. I've even had a few people at farmer's markets, when we give samples, they'll come around and I give my spiel and they take a sample. And they're like, oh, we'll know within 20 or 30 minutes. And they'll come back and they'll be like, it's been 30 minutes. And I'm like, hi? Yeah. Are you happy to see me again? And then they buy like 16,000 loaves because this is the first bread that we've been able to eat. That's so cool. One of these days I'll have the guts to do that. In fact, I'm told that other celiacs who go to Greece and Italy don't have a problem.

24:46 Yeah, well, it's part of that same thing that I'm describing, that there are strong allergies to wheat, but there's also a lot of it could be the way that wheat is grown and what's been sprayed on it and how it's been fermented or not. So milling, the freshness of the flour, the choices you make affect crust, crumb aroma, I'm reading, and the flavor. Talk about that. Yeah, well, we, you know, and this is probably another distinguishing, you know, characteristic of the breads we make it. I was just talking to a friend earlier, like it would be easy to say we stick with one flower. Here's what we use. You know, we get it from wherever and that's, that's it. But we, you know, a lot of this business is, was born out of experimentation, was born out of seasonality and local, uh, local bore ethos kind of. So we, um, we use a bunch of different flowers and, uh, we try and, um, we, so, so, so some of the, some of the grains we use are fresh milled here.

25:44 You know, in-house, we have a small grain mill. And so we seek out ancient grains or heirloom grains that aren't really grown anymore for that purpose. And I'm in conversation with a farmer up in Maine right now waiting for the crop to get tested to go pick up like, you know, a few hundred pounds by car in western Maine. Yeah. Again, regeneratively organic grown. So that's the kind of stuff we like to do for really that whole grain, fresh milled approach. Then we'll use the rest, you know, a lot of the rest of the grain is. Either stone ground, which means like, you know, it's it's well, basically like our ancestors used to do a giant stone that's turning. And that is also keeping all of the characteristics like the aroma. So you're getting a lot of the aroma and 100 percent of the grain from the fresh milk. And then the stone ground, though, it's the same thing. You're still getting some of the other parts of the bran and the germ there. The endosperm is what white flour is made of, but you're getting some of the other pieces of the grain itself when you when you get stone ground because a roller mill traditional, that's what King Arthur, everybody, you know, that's what they're using today since 1960s. Everything is roller mill. And that is basically mostly the endosperm. They separate the grain before it even goes through and you're tossing the rest out.

26:58 And so those three flour types, we do use some roller mills. Why? Because we want the bread to rise nicely and get a nice, tall, lofty, soft feel inside and a crispiness that, you know, you kind of need. But we really push the grain content. And it's, again, from some of that heirloom grain that's fresh milled where you get the aroma that's still there when you cut into it because how freshly it's used. And some of that stone ground local grain that is also contributing lots of extra and nutrition. They like to say it's about 85% of the grain as it goes into the mill by weight. So you're 85% extraction, like they call it. And then, but about 93% of the nutrition that is like inside. So like, you're really getting a lot of it.

27:43 And this is hard to explain to customers because they're like, Oh, is it whole wheat? I'm like, well, first of all, that's a lie. It's just a marketing ploy. Like it doesn't really mean anything. And so, but, but anyway, suffice to say, we're getting all those characteristics you just asked about. through this, the use of these three different types of milled flowers, not to mention the grains themselves. Sometimes we source really special ones like Rouge de Bordeaux when they were growing it locally, which is from the Bordeaux region of France. And while, you know, Red Fife or Wild Turkey Red or Yokoroho, all these different kind of heirloom grains that, you know, are not, are not typically seen anywhere anymore. Sarah, when he talks like that, do you just swoon?

28:24 No. I mean, I've always. Said it makes my soul happy to see his soul happy. I understand the types of things. That we get and I manage a lot of the stock and the inventory and everything, but like, I don't, understand the baking aspect of things. And I'm not that great at math. So, which is something that you have to be good at. Um, so no, I mean, I, I very much, the sourcing is very much important and further all of the, the sourcing methodologies. I mean, anything fresh, all the produce we try to get locally, if we. Make you know, a seasonal loaf. And we, we really, it really matters to us.

29:04 And I always say that Andreas has like the need to feed. We love to cook and we're foodies anyway. So I think this is kind of like a natural extension and place for him to experiment. He definitely uses that engineering brain in the process though. Yeah. Yeah. That's part of what makes it exciting. There's definitely a lot of science involved, but it's also like art as well. So, How has that engineering side benefited you? How has it perhaps even hindered you? Yeah, I mean, i uh we're we're doing a panettone uh consult master class if you will trying to get ready for the season here which is kicking off um well november 1st but we're already making some for the fall and uh and this is a very a very technical bread it's considered like the mount everest of sourdough so to speak but Um, you know, interacting with this fellow, he said, you know, you have a lot of unique sort of analytical talents. I don't really see with a lot of people. They're usually like, yeah, just I'll feed it, whatever.

30:02 I'll do whatever. I'll temperature adds five degrees up, five degrees down. Like, you know, so I do have some of that innate analytical skill that comes from the engineering side. I would say, you know, all of the bread making uses it in some way, maybe panettone the most. So it helps from that angle, kind of understanding, wanting to drive at the why we're doing things a certain way, not really wanting to follow a recipe. And what's interesting is, and I think it says it somewhere in our branding, like, you know, sourdough is not a recipe and it's not a flavor. It's a process. I've got that in both. Yep. Yeah. So I walk into. The kitchen sometimes and he'll just be like drifting off and like muttering numbers and calculations. I'll be like, I'll come back later. Like whatever you're doing.

30:43 I don't know. I'll be back. Yeah, there's definitely a lot of that going on. How is it hindered? It's like in the same way, right? Like over reading things, over analyzing things, you know, trying to trying to think about things, maybe too many levels deep and not letting the sort of the artistic aspect drive the process, which there is definitely is some of that. Um, so yeah. Now are you beyond a home oven? Yeah. Yeah. We're definitely, there was some stories around that. We have a pretty nice wolf oven actually of like double oven, but yeah. And we had recently redone our kitchen, not related to the business at all. Everyone's like, wow, you built a nice kitchen for this business. I'm like, no, if we were doing it for the business, we would have made it cheaper. But like, you know, you put commercial grade stuff in there, not like sort of high-end appliances.

31:26 But yeah, we started with that. Lots of Dutch ovens. I mean, this is a business, you know, a podcast on business. This was just like a low-cost way to enter the game, so to speak. There are other ways. You know, we know other people who are like, buy all the equipment and just go full balls to the wall from the start. I personally think, you know, I did not take that approach. We, we kind of learned with the business and we, we learned with the process and that was the whole reason we started it. But we're, yeah, we're outside of the home oven. It was about, I don't know, six months in, we obviously knew the oven we wanted to get, but we didn't really want to do it out of pocket. So we basically bootstrapped the financing for a lot of our initial CapEx. And, uh, and so about six months in or something like that, we got a micro bakery oven made in the UK guys. Fantastic. Um, Um, got to meet him as well, but, but, uh, just as a network, a full network of bakers all around the world that own this oven that helped inspire me to start this business in the first place. Long story there, but yeah, but it's a great source of inspiration from what all the other bakers are doing with ovens like these.

32:27 How's it heated fire gas? I mean, uh, electric gas. Yeah, it's, it's electric. It's like a, basically a deck oven, but a small one, like the size of a commercial fridge in a way. Um, so it's like, it's like having another fridge kind of, but, uh, And but you need a 240 volt, you know, the 240 volt electric. So it's like a dryer plugs type of thing. And it takes about two and a half hours to preheat to get to that like 500 degree mark or so. And then after that, you can really just continue baking like 12 to 15 loaves at a time every 40 minutes. When you pre-start capacity from like six loaves at a time to up to 15, it's a huge difference. Yeah, much more consistent, too. So since it's a business theme here, did you need zoning variances of any kind?

33:10 Were you good to go? Yeah, we did. I mean, we had to. Yeah, we definitely had to. Yeah, we had to get inspected and we had to submit all the plans and stuff. And I had to get the serve safe, you know, manager licenses. And we did go through the town's board of health and all that. So, yeah, yeah, definitely. There was a lot of that. We started that early. Like we knew that those were going to be like, yeah. kind of boring, but necessary bottlenecks to get through. And then it's like, all right, we have all this. Might as well start selling. And we started, you know, like you mentioned in February. All right. We're going to take our second break right here. We'll be back in just one more minute with Andreas and Sarah. You're listening to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Hallinan on W4CY Radio. That's W4CY. com. Don't go away. More helpful information is coming right up right here on Winning Business Radio.

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35:20 And now back to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Hallinan, presenting exciting topics and expert guests with one goal in mind, to help you succeed in business. Here once again is Kevin Hallinan. All right, we're back with Andreas and Sarah Apostolopoulos, owners of Harris Health, Acton, Massachusetts. I said that, you know, as I was writing this out, it was in my brain. It doesn't say that it says hearth. Somehow I know a Harris health company, Harris hearth, of course, a mass based actin mass-based micro bakery, not brewery. Um, I wanted to ask you this here. You don't just want to scale for the sake of scale. No, these are limited productions.

36:10 Why do you want to keep it limited? And then how do you scale grow? Maybe what's your plan for the future? Um, yeah, I mean, I guess keeping it limited as easy as like, we only have so much time in the day, right. Um, balancing all the stuff that we do. So it also gives it a certain, uh, there's a certain hype around all the jobs that we do. It's not available all the time. We do like that model because it allows us to control our regular lives around it and control the pace that we offer things. But it's also the spirit of products like these, like panettone, which is seasonal or like the sourdough breads, um, if you're going to do them artisanally like this, there really is a certain amount of care and small batch processing that you have to do and you can scale it.

36:56 And it has been done successfully by some other bakeries. Um, and to some extent, once you scale into a certain, like certain size, you almost have to continue scaling and, and, um, and, you know, leveraging all of your assets to consistently, it's like, it's like there's economies of scale. So once you enter that territory, you're really going to be, you're really going to see success once you have like four or five bakeries all around town and you're selling bread to all these wholesale clients. It's a volume game at that point. And we're choosing to see it a little bit differently that, you know, we want to be a certain size to serve our, our local area and Massachusetts in general. But, um, we also don't want to sacrifice the quality in our around sourcing and, you know, being seasonal and, like, being able to go to a local farm and get, like, you know, utility-grade fruit to make something or utility-grade vegetables to put in or herbs or whatnot to put in a product that we make.

37:52 So, you know, if we. Need to all of a sudden start making thousands of, like, that's not sustainable for the other local businesses and farms that we try to support either. Some truth to that, yeah. But in general, yeah, as far as, I think we're just trying to lean in more towards that sort of hype model that we've got going on, specifically around things like the panettone, right? That's what we've been trying to educate customers on what the real thing really is and how truly difficult it is to make and give them some reasons to buy, right? We've invested in some branding and new boxes and a website that makes it fun and easy to order. And so, you know, sort of continuing to move in directions that align and support that type of uh, model, uh, and in a way from sort of a commodity always available type of approach. Um, and the time may come where we need more space to do what we're doing or some help to do what we're doing, but, um.

38:48 That's why we have children eventually, you know. That's exactly it. So yeah, no pressure, no pressure. Yeah. But we're, you know, we're really taking every day as a, as a learning opportunity and as an exposure to being in the food business, being, being in the side of the food business, that's trying to educate how broken our food system really is. Yeah. And, uh, so there's, there's an educational mission here too, even if, you know, we don't talk about it that, that often, but, um, but yeah, we're just taking it, you know, one day at a time and, and trying to, trying to get the word out that there's another way to bread in town. Well, we're going to come back to this. We're going to give you a better plug at the end, but for now it's, HarrisHearthBreads.com. I love this line. Four days to make, moments to disappear. It's got to be good.

39:32 So talk about the living Italian sourdough culture. Oh, yeah. So that's... Oh, my gosh. I mean, I've been struggling with that for the last couple weeks. So, yeah, it's... Apparently, even more demanding than I thought, like sort of like having a child of some kind. Because, again, I'm working with a number of consultants. Did you have to talk to it once in a while? No, no. But it does have a name. We call it Massimo. But actually, there's one in the proofer. It's scaling right now for a big batch of Panettone. Actually, we're about to start that after this. interview um so i'm like all anxious but uh but yeah that starter is is everything we started a couple years ago um uh from scratch and then we had we had some from other bakers and sort of you know kind of just sort of try to keep it alive it's died a couple times revived it and now we're in that mode of of the way the my consultant likes to say is is training it like an olympian And then really trying to build up the strength. But it's basically a piece of dough. It's like a firm starter. It's not liquid like the rest of ours.

40:35 Oh, okay. And it's really maintained in a very precise way. And I don't think I even have the tools to maintain it precisely enough. But, you know, specific temperatures, everything Celsius, specific pHs. So you're really trying to balance the types of bacteria that are in there. I mean, it's basically like making wine. And a lot of winemakers, if they're not natural winemakers and they're buying yeasts, they are buying specific strains of bacteria and specific strains of yeast to make a specific kind of wine. And then that's the starting point. It controls where they can go, and then the process controls the rest of it. But for natural winemaking, though, or natural bread making in this case, it's the same idea. You're maintaining that culture in a very specific way To get the flavors and performance you want out of it.

41:19 Tell us a little bit more about the process and define proof. Well, proofing is a little bit different than fermentation in the sense that it's really about the volume the product is getting as it's growing in volume so that it gets ready to go into the oven. But the four-day process is really like a lot of the first day and a half or so are preparation of the starter. Multiple sequential feedings. specific ratios specific types of flour temperatures of ingredients holding temperatures ph humidity even it's like what was your humidity oh this is why it didn't work out you have to be drier than that these are things that just happened today it's like it was too dry it dried out you gotta go we gotta change this you gotta do that so like that's day one day one and a half in a way and then there's it's a two dough system so you effectively like your first dough Your starter leavens the first dough and your first dough leavens the whole thing. And then the whole thing has to ferment for crazy long amounts of time.

42:11 Like the first dough, once you mix it, which we're about to, it'll be ready like, you know, 5 a.m. tomorrow. It's like a 12-hour situation. And that's if you're lucky. And then, you know, then you go mix the second dough for a whole hour and that has to ferment another hour or two. Then you divide it, put it in the molds, the little, you know, Italian panettone molds. And it could go another 6, 8, 10, 12 hours until you're actually putting. It in the oven. Yeah, that's our small one. And we have different sizes and all that. But we may choose to ferment it even longer cold to stage them so they go in the oven. you know, in a, in a sequential fashion that we don't get overwhelmed by things like going crazy. And then I have one of the most stressful jobs. I get to flip them the second the oven door opens.

42:52 Yeah. Yeah. You got to flip them upside down. Otherwise like a souffle, they'll just go crashing down to extremely fragile truck. And they're hung, right? Yeah. They're hung upside down. That's a whole thing too. Like where to hang them from. And we've developed all sorts of engineering, like doodads and things to be able to hang them upside down efficiently. And, uh, yeah, it's like a little Santa's workshop in here. And you can never really tell which ones are going to let loose. And then we call those the headless horsemen drop out of the molds because the cap just like detaches. Yeah. That's when you know, you messed up three second. Does a three second rule apply? Yeah. I grew up eating on a tone. I mean, the crappy kind compared to the stuff we make now, the dry in the boxes from the grocery store, but I love on a tone. So like, I'm excited for Pontotone season, but I I'm not, cause I have no control.

43:43 All right. Here's a tough business question. Okay. And this is mostly for Sarah, but Andres too. What's it like working with your spouse so closely? Uh, we honestly do work together as a team really well. We know kind of people when we host parties, people come over and they kind of see us like do the dance around each other. Cause we know how to participate in each other's moves and stuff. Um, There is barking. There is swearing. There is various things that we say to each other when things are tough. Yeah. Say it in Greek or Italian. No one will know. Oh, that's what we do. But no, I do enjoy it overall. And I'm grateful that we do have the chemistry to be able to work together.

44:27 There obviously are, you know, drawbacks and pluses and minuses, but we've, we've made it work. And the, the frustration, at least on my part, has lessened over the years. So that's good. You want to add or take the win? No, no, I think I agree. We work together pretty well. And, yeah, just different personalities, but both with an attention to detail and to getting the process and the product right. Sarah, how do you manage the farmer's markets? Is that seasonal marketing and selling? Tell us a little bit about that. The so this we we completed our third season of the Acton Boxborough Farmers Market, kind of like our town's market that goes from mid-June to mid-October every year.

45:15 I primarily did most of the markets. He took over a few. I'm usually better people facing. I can read people a lot better and. Can tell, like, if not, like if they're going to walk up and if they're a regular, I'm really good. With remembering horrible names. Um, but just kind of telling like, Oh, should I give the full spiel to this person? Do they actually care? Do they actually not? Um, and by the time he's done baking, he's real cranky. He's not real people friendly, which is not real great. If they like bread, I'm happy to talk to them. Um, no, I do enjoy the markets and I do remember the regulars and I think it makes an impact that, you know, when the regular gets remembered, you know, I'll be honest, like, I don't know your name, but you bought this, this, and this last week.

45:59 And they're like, Oh my gosh. So making that like human connection has always been important to me and making sure that like people are happy and customer service and that type of thing. So, uh, market season has officially ended. Thank God. Cause I'm tired. Um, but we do have. Some holiday events and stuff coming up specifically on a tone focus that I think. We'll, we'll trade off on. Are you prepared to mention those? You want to plug those at all? Yeah. Well, we, um, I guess the best ones to mention are our collaboration with the Boston Public Market that we're doing for their winter market. So we'll be there the weekend after Thanksgiving and the weekend before Christmas, both Saturday and Sunday. We'll get some of the Northenders looking for an Italian suite. But we'll also be in Concord for the Umbrella Arts Festival, I think the first week in December, and some other local holiday markets and Thanksgiving markets around our area. All right.

46:56 You have holiday 26 flavors coming out. Talk about those. I've got the list, but you guys probably know it too. Yeah. Yeah. So we, yeah, we're really excited. Um, we, and we're doing some new flavors this year compared to last, but, but basically I think we're covering a lot of the traditional Italian bases and even some of the really fancy ones as well. A lot of these are inspired from Italy. Um, so we, we have the panettone is yeah. And like six or seven flavors. We have a classical, which is like, Candied citrus and Belgian dark chocolate. We have a version that we're doing with candied pear from Emilia-Romagna in dark chocolate. Which I am really excited about. Yeah, that's a great one. We had that at Forno Brisa in Bologna earlier. We're doing a candied apricot in Gianduja, which is like a hazelnut paste from Piemonte. And also candied amarena cherries, pistachio, and white chocolate. candied lemon and dark chocolate.

47:54 You're making me hungry. Me too. Me too. No kidding. And there's not one flavor I wouldn't try. Yeah. They all sound very appealing. They're all too good. Although I will say I will probably lean to the espresso and dark chocolate. That's a classic combo. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's one of the ones we offered. We offered it for Father's Day actually this year and hoping it makes its way back onto the menu. And you have three different sizes and you've trademarked one of them. The panettini, yeah. I don't know. As far as I know, no one else is calling it that, but it is. It is the panettini. Yeah. Also known as a snack to me because I can- We call it serving for two, but- And then this is our medium size, and then this is the large size.

48:38 Yeah, so we call this medio basso, and then we have the grande basso. And this is about 500 grams. The big one's about 825. The small one's about 150. And they rise- prominently above the mold, so they look pretty striking. I usually like to tell customers it's not really a plug for profitability on our end. It's more of the product. The larger the size that you buy, the even better it is because there's something about the chemistry and how this bakes that you have a larger dough mass. It takes longer for it to bake. And all of that chemical magic that's happening in there takes longer to happen, and that results in even softer, even more, you know, sweet and, and, uh, and luxurious product in a way. So, and it makes a striking appearance on a holiday table to the large one. All right.

49:23 We are almost out of time. In fact, we are, tell us about the launch list and then we'll plug you one more time. Oh yeah. Yeah. Well, um, we were really trying to get friends that know about our Panettone to tell friends that don't. And, uh, we have a, we have a signup list on our website that allows folks to, uh, get a special referral link and send it to friends of theirs. And it's kind of a little, a fun little game where, you know, if you take that link that you've been given and refer it to a whole bunch of people that, that join our, uh, also join our list, you get to climb that list. And the people at the top are winning, you know, free panettone and, and everyone on the list that refers someone is winning some percent off or a free panettini. So we've got these different rewards here and just makes it fun. That's cool. Harris hearth breads.com Harris hearts, hearth breads.com. Guys, this has been so much fun. This is, for me, I mean, you know, I love the show, but this wasn't a particularly fun one. So hope you had a good time and I know it was enjoyable for me, so I'm sure it's enjoyable for others.

50:17 Yeah, I appreciate it, Kevin. Thank you so much for your time. You're welcome. Thanks, everybody, for watching and listening. This is a show about business, about successes and challenges. If you've got concerns. About the sales effectiveness of your company, whether your team is you, it's small or it's large, and you're in Massachusetts or you're referred to me by one of my clients, and you'd like to learn more about implementing Sandler in your business, contact me. You can go to my website, go.sandler.com slash KJH, or email me kevin.hallenan at sandler.com. You can use the winning business radio email if you like. At Sandler Training, we develop sales teams at the high achievers and sales leaders into true coaches and mentors. Listen, we're not right for everybody, but maybe we should have a conversation.

51:01 Thank you, as always, to producer and engineer Juan. Thank you, Juan, for another job well done. Join us again next Monday, November 5th, 4 p.m. Eastern. We'll have another fun conversation. Until then, this is Kevin Hallinan. You've been listening to Winning Business Radio with your host, Kevin Hallinan. If you missed any part of this episode, the podcast is available on Talk4Podcasting and iHeartRadio. For more information and questions, go to winningbusinessradio.com or check us out on social media. Tune in again next week and every Monday at 4 p.m. Eastern Time to listen live to Winning Business Radio on W4CY Radio, W4CY. Com.

51:42 Until then, let's succeed where others have failed and win in business with Kevin Hallinan and Winning Business Radio.