"Artisan" baguettes?
I'm wondering if there is a market segment that cares about baguettes au levain made by hand versus formed from a sheeter. I suppose if the formula is just levain, salt and water, raised in couche and baked on a stone, it would qualify as "artisan" but I wonder if there are people who care enough about the crumb to pay more for a hand-formed baguette.
What about a completely hand-mixed, hand-formed, wood-fired baguette? Is there any market that would pay for such an additional value? The difference in the bread would be a more open crumb (not smushed by the sheeter), and a creamier, non-oxidized color inside. And the rest would probably just be sentimental. But still, maybe some people pay for sentiment. What do you think? Would YOU pay more?
Hi Pioneer Foodie
It sounds like a great product to me but perhaps this is not the correct place to ask the question "would you pay more?". This is for two reasons: 1) the vast majority of people on this forum love good bread and yours sounds good, so that would tend to produce an answer biased towards "Yes"; 2) a large proportion of people on this forum have/are/will be struggling to produce a great baguettte themselves so that would biase the answer towards "No" (because thet would rather make it themselves).
Whichever sort of answers you get will be very strongly biased because you are asking bread lovers and bakers. Perhaps you should try a little real life market research at your local farmers' market?
If you could convince a high end resturant to try your breads you may have a better chance. Customers of these resturants expect the best.
Jim