Belvoir Bakery, based in Langar, makes its produce overnight so it is fresh every week for Grantham Market
A family-run bakery makes all of its products overnight to be sold fresh on the market.
Belvoir Bakery, based in Langar, has had a stall on Grantham Market for 18 years and continues to serve fresh produce that is baked overnight.
Rob Whellams, 58, runs the business with wife Tracey, with the help of their daughter Sienna and Tracey’s sons Jake and Tyler.
The stall is being showcased as part of a Journal series of features to support Grantham Market.
“We’re very well supported at Grantham,” said Rob. “We spend a lot of time on weather apps because we bake for the weather.
“Ironically, we do better at Easter than we do at Christmas. It depends how it falls really.
“We try to keep it all local. From production to it being on the stall at Grantham, you’re looking at three and a half to four hours, it just doesn’t get better than that.”
Rob and Tracey were originally in the mobile phone industry, but started the stall as they were both foodies.
Rob continued: “We started 18 years ago with £30 of bread. We sold out in 45 minutes and I thought, this has got legs.
“In the first couple of years we bought from other people and just sold it on, then 15 years ago, we bit the bullet and started our own bakery.
“We are the only bakery round here that bakes at night. We bake specifically for our markets. We do ten a week.”
Jake has run the Grantham stall for the last three years, while Tyler does the IT for the business.
Rob said: “My daughter Sienna runs the day shift and I’ve got three girls that bake cakes all day.
“Fresh doughnuts to amazing cookie dough stacks. They’re so talented. It’s a proper family-run business.
“When anything goes wrong, everyone pulls together.“
Belvoir Bakery has customers at Grantham that have been supporting the market stall for 15 years.
“I’m a people person,” said Rob. “I really enjoy getting feedback from customers and we’ve tweaked many loaves through customer feedback.
“If we make something that’s not all that, they’ll tell us.
“Because we’re small, if we don’t sell something we don’t make it anymore. If someone says why don’t you try this, we do.
“It’s a service as well. We serve a lot of older people that don’t get to talk to many other people in the week.”
When asked how Grantham Market could be improved, Rob stressed the importance of raising awareness of what was available down there.
He said: “It's a show and tell. People need to know what they can get. Do they realise how fresh it is?”
You can find Belvoir Bakery on Grantham Market every Saturday.
