KANSAS CITY, MO — About an hour’s drive north of Portland, ME, is the rural community of Winslow. Situated on the East bank of the Kennebec River, this historic town has roots dating back to 1771. With its share of ups and downs, Winslow is currently undergoing a renaissance of sorts, led by forward-thinking businesses such as Better With Buckwheat.
In 2022, this better-for-you artisanal snack manufacturer planted roots in Winslow to accommodate a substantial increase in demand and solidify its commitment to supporting Maine, including — and more specifically — its rural communities. In the two years since, Better With Buckwheat has accomplished both goals.
The company, which originally launched in 2014 under the name Maine Crisp, was started by Karen Getz who was seeking a great-tasting, gluten-free cracker but wasn’t having much luck finding one. With a few successful entrepreneurial endeavors already under her belt, Getz was curious as to whether she could make the cracker she envisioned. Her product development research led her to the buckwheat fields of Aroostook County, ME.
Buckwheat checked all the boxes: naturally gluten-free, nutrient-dense and regenerative. From there, a partnership with buckwheat grower Bouchard Family Farm was formed, and the farm remains the company’s primary supplier today.
In the early days, Maine Crisp sold one product: Cranberry Almond Crisps.
Fast forward to 2022 when Maine Crisp moved production to an 18,000-square-foot, 100% gluten-free facility that was formerly a warehouse. One year later, as part of a strategic move that would allow expansion into additional snacking categories, it rebranded as Better With Buckwheat.
Today, the company produces five varieties of crisps and three flavors of snack crackers.
“Our goal is to become a buckwheat-based snacking company,” said Lewis Goldstein, who joined the company as CEO in 2022 after serving 18 months on its board of directors. “The snack crackers expand our portfolio beyond the crisps, which are marketed toward adult consumers. The crackers are more family-friendly; they appeal to both kids and adults.”
As a product line, the crisps carry their original name — Maine Crisp — but fall under the Better With Buckwheat brand. They’re made from 100% Tartary buckwheat supplied exclusively by Bouchard. Better With Buckwheat snack crackers are made with a proprietary blend of Tartary and common buckwheat, which imparts a unique flavor to the finished product. In keeping with its commitment to support Maine’s economy, the company sources locally as much as possible, including everything from ingredients to packaging materials.
“Our goal is to become a buckwheat-based snacking company. The snack crackers expand our portfolio beyond the crisps.” — Lewis Goldstein | CEO | Better With Buckwheat
To expand its portfolio and keep up with the increased demand that came with national distribution contracts with UNFI and KeHE, Better With Buckwheat invested heavily in its front- and back-end operations, installing a Vemag extruder and Reiser dough sheeter, two additional Revent rack ovens (bringing the total to four), and an Artypac automated packaging line with a Yamato scale that eliminated hand weighing and bagging.
Tapping into local and state resources has been essential to keeping Better With Buckwheat on an upward trajectory. For example, after moving into the new space, the team worked with the Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership to design critical workflow enhancements.
“The process flow is optimized to reduce downtime and ensure that bottlenecks operate at capacity, leading to increased efficiency and productivity,” said Joshua Wright, the bakery’s director of operations.
A large part of what Better With Buckwheat has achieved so far was made possible by a $500,000 grant from the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry’s Agricultural Infrastructure Program. Receiving the grant was a pivotal moment; it allowed the company to purchase much-needed equipment and expand its team, which in turn created local jobs. The grant also opened doors to additional nationwide distribution opportunities and funding.
“I don’t know if we would have been able to get to this scale and receive additional funding without this grant,” Goldstein said. “We recently received a $250,000 loan from Whole Foods’ local producer program because we’re now national in all the Whole Foods stores. We couldn’t have accomplished that if we were still doing everything by hand and didn’t have the extra ovens and all the things this grant enabled us to do. It was a real game changer for our small company.”
This has been adapted from the October | Q4 2024 issue of Commercial Baking. Read the full story in the digital edition here.
