22 Dec 2025
Texture is one of the fastest ways consumers judge your quality. Before flavor fully registers, the bite already tells a story. Is it soft and melting, crisp and crackly, light and airy, or perfectly flaky? If the texture is off, the product is perceived as stale, no matter how good the recipe is.
The world’s largest consumer research program in the bakery, patisserie and chocolate industry, Taste Tomorrow, shows that texture and freshness cues strongly influence perceived quality and repurchase. Across bread, buns, and viennoiserie, people want products that deliver the promised eating experience every time they choose them.
In this article we’re sharing the enduring texture and freshness expectations consumers hold today, and how Puratos helps you meet them in real bakery life (at scale).
Texture is the first promise your brand must keep
Every bakery classic has a built-in texture expectation.
A baguette should crackle. A brioche should melt. A croissant should flake. A bread loaf should slice clean with a resilient crumb. When that expectation is met, the product feels satisfying and reliable, and the consumers trust to repurchase it.
What that means for bakeries
Texture is the driver of premium perception. It’s not a detail.
How Puratos helps
Puratos supports category-specific texture targets through improver and enzyme expertise designed to help you shape crumb structure, crust behavior, bite, and resilience the way your customers expect for that finished product.
Freshness is experienced by enjoyment, not the date
Consumers do not define freshness by the production date. They define it by how the product behaves when they eat it. A roll that stays soft and elastic, a sandwich bread that does not crumble, a crusty loaf that retains a pleasant crust are all perceived as fresher.
What that means for bakeries
The real commercial goal is not “fresh longer”. It is “enjoyable longer. This reduces complaints, encourages repeat purchases, and protects your margin.
How Puratos helps
We help you extend the enjoyment window by supporting softness retention, crumb resilience, and bite consistency through improver and mixes that fit your recipe style and scale.
Scaling is where texture fails first
When bakeries grow, texture is the first thing to drift. Flour variation, process tolerance, proofing windows, freezing or bake-off models, and distribution timelines can all change crumb and crust.
What that means for bakeries
The bigger the system, the harder it is to keep texture identical. Yet that is exactly what customers demand.
How Puratos helps
We support you in mastering ingredient interactions and process tolerance so your texture signature stays stable across lines, sites, and production realities. It is about ensuring that the "future" of your product is as consistent as its "past”.
Contrasting textures are becoming everyday expectations
Consumers increasingly enjoy breads and baked goods with contrast. Soft inside with a thin crisp exterior. Airy crumb with a more structured bite. Flaky layers with a tender center. It is a long-term shift in what feels rewarding to eat.
What that means for bakeries
If the contrast disappears, the product feels flat, even if the flavor is good.
How Puratos helps
Puratos solutions help you engineer and stabilize targeted contrasts, for example keeping flake definition while preserving tenderness in laminated goods, or supporting a light open crumb while maintaining crust quality in breads.
Reformulation must protect signature bite
Whether you introduce plant-based ingredients, add nutrition, or remove certain components, consumers still expect the same mouthfeel. A great idea fails fast if the texture shifts too much.
What that means for bakeries
Better-for-you or more sustainable recipes only work when the eating experience stays familiar.
How Puratos helps
We help you reformulate while protecting softness, flakiness, and crumb structure with solutions built for texture stability under change.
Turning insights into tangible results with Puratos services
Texture leadership is not trial and error. It is co-creation and validation.
Innovation Centers
In Puratos Innovation Centers scattered across the globe, bakery experts work with you to prototype and refine texture targets for specific finished goods, on equipment that mirrors your own production lines.
Sensory validation and consumer testing
With sensory tools like Sensobus, you can validate if your texture and freshness targets match real consumer preference before scaling them into your range.
Ready to protect and differentiate your texture signature?
Explore our best-selling, universal Puratos solution ranges for bakery texture and freshness, including improvers and mixes for softness and resilience, solutions for crisp crust and open crumb, and those which support lift, flake, and structure. Find the right texture tools for your finished goods, process, and scale. For even more personalized advice, contact your local Puratos representative to get started.
