The desire for a “feel good factor” has seen mince pies fly off the shelves at a Norwich bakery weeks earlier than usual.
Linzers Bakery, on Albertine Close, started selling the festive pastries this week and, with 12 weeks until Christmas, they are proving popular.
Lucy Thackham, office manager, said the pandemic seemed to have blurred usual seasonal lines in customer demand.
“We usually start selling them around mid-October to the beginning of November, but we have started early,” she said.
“We were making hot cross buns until the end of last week - usually it’s a couple of weeks after Easter and the call for them drops off, but people need a feel good factor.”
“In mid-September the hot cross buns were starting to drop-off so as everyone was talking about Christmas we thought we’d start, and they have been selling very well.”
She said the bakery was usually led by the seasons, and tried to avoid selling everything all-year round, but she said they wanted to respond to demand in a challenging year.
The majority of the mince pies have been sold to independent shops, but Ms Thackahm said some were being delivered to people’s homes.
It comes after a busy year for the bakery, which continued selling to local traders and the Central and East of England Co-operative stores.
“It was absolutely insane,” she said. “We told people we were doing home deliveries, even if they weren’t self-isolating, and that was barmy too.
“The boys were working all hours, but we didn’t have issues with flour supplies luckily.”
She said the business had returned to calmer levels in the last few months.
Linzers was founded in 1984 by Andrew and Susan Bell, with its first shop on London Street. The bakery was built in 2006.
Central England Co-op does not usually stock mine pies until the end of September, but launched the products - as well as Christmas puddings - from Wednesday, September 9 in response, it said, to calls from customers in-store and on social media.
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