Bagel Bites

Bagel Bites may be less than two inches in diameter, but they are big business nationally. And thanks in large part to a $300,000 grant from the Lee County Economic Development Office, the business of producing the popular snacks is staying put in Southwest Florida.

Last spring the H.J. Heinz Company, parent of Ore Ida, considered consolidating its Fort Myers Bagel Bites production plant with another in Idaho. And with the plant would have gone about 250 jobs.

Sensing the impact of the move, the Lee County Economic Development Office quickly devised an incentive package, $200,000 from the county's Job Opportunity Program and $100,000 from Community Redevelopment funds. "We went right to work," says Janet Watermeier, EDO director.

The EDO's budget, which comes from general revenues and from tourist taxes, is complemented by money set aside by the Lee County Commission for business incentives. The idea behind the incentives is to create and/or keep job opportunities in the area. "What we're trying to do is diversify the economy and bring high-quality jobs to the area," she says.

As it turns out, the incentive plan worked. The Bagel Bites plant not only stayed put, it underwent an $8 million expansion, adding 21,000 square feet and about 20 new jobs. Now almost all Bagel Bites distributed in North America are produced at the expanded facility. The Lee EDO estimates the plant has an annual impact of $22.9 million to the local economy.

Bagel Know-how

Bob Mosher, one of the inventors of Bagel Bites, says he first produced the miniature pizza -topped bagel snacks for his catering business. In 1985 he sold the unique idea to Labatt's, owned by Ore Ida, a subsidiary of Pittsburgh-based Heinz. In 1991 the current plant was built.

The production idea is simple enough - the bagels are made from scratch, baked, topped, frozen and packaged. The production process, however, is anything but simple. A complicated system of conveyor belts winds through the plant, traveling to and from specialized machinery that performs dozens of carefully-choreographed steps, from forming the dough into round bagel shapes to freezing the bites in mass quantities and packaging and storing them for distribution.

And because the plant churns out nearly 3 million bites per day, or 800 pieces a minute, the scale of the machinery is necessarily large. Every day about 2,000 gallons of sauce and 40,000 pounds of frozen topping ingredients are used in production.

The 21,000-foot expansion, explains Mosher, enabled the plant to make its sauce in-house, expand holding freezer capacity and expand the 18,000 square-foot bakery to 13 walk-in sized ovens.

During a June 26 ribbon cutting, plant employees and their families, managers, Lee EDO representatives and dozens of others got the chance to tour the plant facilities and taste the fruits -rather, bagels -- of their efforts. And oh, were the Bagel Bites tasty.

Bagel Bites At A Glance

Founded in Fort Myers: 1985

Current Factory Built: 1991

Bites Produced Per Day: 2.7 million

Size of Facility: 75,000 square feet

Expansion Size: 21,000 square feet

Capital Spending: $8 million

Number of Employees: 250

Jobs Created by Expansion: 20

Annual Payroll: $7.9 million

Annual Sales: $80 million