Erin Baker’s breakfast cookies, a local establishment aptly named for their founder, have become a ubiquitous sight in grocery stores, coffee stands, and vending machines in Bellingham and beyond.
The business began in 1994, when Erin Baker created “The Original Breakfast Cookie” at the Whidbey Island Fairgrounds.
“I grew up in an entrepreneurial family,” says Baker. “My mom was an entrepreneur. She had to run businesses. I learned from a very young age how to run a business, and so it was pretty familiar to me. When I was 22, I started baking a lot, last name being Baker, and created a product called the breakfast cookie: very similar to something that my mom made for us when we were kids, an oatmeal-based energy snack powered with fruit.”
Since then, Erin Baker’s has expanded into snack mixes, granola, and other healthy treats made with whole-food ingredients and no artificial flavors.
“I created the breakfast cookie and made it out of some rented kitchen space for the first couple of years of my business,” says Baker. “Then I moved to Bellingham and was working at Avenue Bread and baking my breakfast cookies there. Then, about a year later, I got my own space. I’ve been manufacturing here in Bellingham for 31 years. We make granola, snack mixes, and cookies, and all are better for you. That’s always been the focus.”
Visiting the “Erin Bakery”
Erin Baker’s operates out of a downtown bakery at 427 Ohio Street in Bellingham.
“Our range of products essentially are oatmeal-based, nutritionally dense products,” says Baker. “We’re using oats, we’re using nuts, we’re using dried fruits, we’re using spices to flavor our products, not flavorings. So kind of food the old-fashioned way, kind of slow food – like food that you would make at home, but we make it here.”
The company offers an online store for orders in addition to availability in local outlets such as Haggen, Kroger, Albertsons, and Whole Foods.
“Our hands are still in the dough,” says Baker. “We are manufacturing, but we’re also kind of like a small neighborhood bakery as well. We also bake to order here, which is very unusual for a food manufacturer. So what you’re getting out of the grocery store is pretty fresh.”
Erin Baker’s Reach Beyond Bellingham
Through retailers and wholesalers, Erin Baker’s has spread from Bellingham to regional branches of its outlets.
“You can pretty much find our products all over the country with more of a concentration in the Midwest, the Southwest and the West Coast,” says Baker. “We sell our granola in Florida to a couple of distributors. It’s not heavily distributed on the East Coast or in the southeast, but you probably find our products in kind of random places in those far-off places.”
Erin Baker has a stated commitment to avoiding artificial flavorings that the industry labels “natural” but lack the nutrition of whole foods.
“My commitment to making truly healthy food is, I think, the thing that sets us the most apart,” says Baker. “The other thing that sets us apart from many other food manufacturers is that we make our own food. Most food that you see on the shelf is made by a larger manufacturing company. It’s called co-manufacturing. So Erin Baker is actually at the bakery, overseeing the baking. Because I’m passionate about how it turns out, the quality and the consistency. I’m also passionate about the fact that my people are happy and they’re well taken care of. So, Mom stays with the ship. Mom’s at the bakery every day. That’s unusual, I would say. It makes us different.”
Feeding the Future
Purchases of Erin Baker’s also go toward a good cause: their Help Feed 1 Million Kids Program, donating cookies to local Boys and Girls Clubs.
“Twelve years ago, I was looking for a way to help kids because they are our future,” says Baker. “So I went to the Boys and Girls Clubs, and what I witnessed there impassioned me and encouraged me to start helping immediately. What I witnessed was that some kids don’t have money, trying to find dollars to plug into a vending machine. So I said to the director, ‘How would it be if I brought you some breakfast cookies so you had some healthy, free food for these little birds that are hungry?’ To date, we have donated 1.2 million cookies across 25 clubs primarily here in Western Washington.”
The company also supports other causes for children’s welfare while nurturing local relationships, creating a “like one big family” in the workplace.
“Then the relationships that are built in the doing of that are, that’s a beautiful thing,” says Baker. It’s really privileged to come to work every day and be around people that you really care for.”
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