In the countryside of Tomi City, Nagano Prefecture, Japan, there is a strange bakery called Teiyi. For many years, it only makes two kinds of bread that looks very ugly, but it has become popular in Japan by accident.
The owner, Haru Hirata, was born in Tokyo, but he yearns for a rural life. In 2009, her husband was transferred from Tokyo to Tomi City, Nagano Prefecture, and the couple moved from the bustling Tokyo to the peaceful foot of Mount Makahara.
At first, Haruka Hirata was delighted by the sky and the sky and the free and slow life here, but gradually, the trivial things such as cooking three meals a day occupied her daily life, and she began to feel lonely and bored. Soon after, Haru Hirata found out that she was pregnant. In order to give her children a better financial foundation, after discussing with her husband, who likes baking, decided to open a bakery at home so that everyone can enjoy the “taste of happiness” in pastoral baking.
Harada Hirata poured all his enthusiasm into this new business. She bought the freshest milk from the neighbor’s ranch, mixed wheat, homemade natural yeast, and fermented butter to ferment the dough; she built a traditional stone kiln at home with stones, and through repeated experiments, she created a unique The method of baking bread: first burn the stone kiln for 4 hours, and burn the temperature of the stone kiln to above 400℃, until the kiln cabin is grayish white, move the carbonized wood to the trough under the stone kiln and place it, and then wipe the kiln cabin Clean and let the temperature drop to about 200℃, and finally put the dough into the stone kiln.
The whole process of making bread is complicated and long. Haru Hirata gets up at 4:30 in the morning every day, and starts to add wood to the furnace and start the fire at 5:00. As the firewood slowly crackled in the oven, Hirata began to knead the dough, and while observing the degree of fermentation of the dough, he measured the temperature of the oven.
Hirata’s persistence has brought her a rich return. This kind of bread baked in a stone kiln has a crispy and delicious outer skin, and a fluffy and soft inside. Although it looks a bit ugly, a light bite gives her a rich natural milk aroma. Come, my mouth is full of the “smell of happiness” she expects.
In order to meet the different needs of customers, Hirata Haruka has introduced dozens of kinds of bread, and the popularity of the small shop is also increasing. As business got better and better, Haru Hirata became busier and busier, and the heavy workload made her almost breathless. Because of the increase in the variety of bread, the quality of the bread has declined, and Hirata Haruka feels that his life has run counter to the “smell of happiness”. Recalling the original intention of opening her store, she resolutely decided to streamline it drastically, keeping only the first two bread categories: natural yeast bread and country bread.
In this way, Hirata was relieved from the heavy work at once. In her free time, she started planting flowers and visited nearby handcraft shops. After a while, she had a clearer sales model in her mind. She created the “One Meal A Day” campaign, using two kinds of bread in the store with different foods every day to turn into a delicious and nutritious breakfast . Yesterday, maybe it was the sweet and sour kiwi pie; today, maybe it is the tomato and anchovy pie full of Italian style… She also started to learn floral art, picking different flowers every day to decorate the shop, and collected it from handicraft workshops everywhere. Leather goods, woodware, ceramic dishes, etc. are sold as a complete set. The combination of “one meal a day” and “one flower a day”, a variety of beautiful and exquisite small objects…Hirata Haruka’s shop brings waves of surprises to customers.
The business of the bakery is more prosperous than at the beginning. Hirata has recruited many like-minded shop assistants. With their careful operation, the small bakery has become more and more famous and has become an Internet celebrity for many people to visit Nagano Prefecture to check in. Shop.
With only three days of business a week, Hirata Haruka’s small shop has a turnover of 175 million yen a year, and won the “Best Store Manager” and “Best Store Manager” in participating in the “Color Store” event organized by the famous Japanese company GMO. Two awards for “Excellent Store”. It was Hirata Haruka’s extreme focus on products and persistence in beliefs that finally allowed her to reap her own “taste of happiness”.