A Derby artisan doughnut company is earning national recognition after being shortlisted for a prestigious baking award which recognises excellence in the industry.
Luxury doughnut company, Project D, has been announced as one of three bakeries to be shortlisted for the Online Bakery of the Year category in the respected Baking Industry Awards 2022.
The news comes on the back of the company’s award success in 2021 when the three founders picked up local, regional and national accolades for their business acumen and baking prowess.
Announcing the shortlist, judges said: “The brightly coloured and cheekily named products were delicious and we had trouble selecting from among the fashionable fillings.”
They also praised Project D’s website as ‘easy to navigate’ and said its ‘products arrived swiftly in pristine condition on every order’.
In 2021, the company founders, Max Poynton, Jacob Watts and Matthew Bond, beat off competition from almost 5,000 others to be named among the UK’s brightest new entrepreneurs.
The trio won a Great British Entrepreneur Award which counts the founders of The LAD Bible, Tangle Teezer and Grenade as former winners. They impressed judges including Cath Kidston, former Dragon’s Den star James Caan and Ann Summers’ creator Jacqueline Gold.
The bakery, which sells handcrafted, brightly coloured and Instagram-friendly doughnuts across the UK, also picked up two trophies at the Derbyshire Live Business Awards for Start-up Business of the Year and SME Business of the Year.
It also won the Entrepreneur of the Year title in the Generation Next Awards, which were delivered in partnership with the University of Derby and form part of East Midlands Chamber’s new network for professionals and business owners aged under 35.
And in the Chamber’s own business awards the company scooped the title Small Business of the Year, and picked up an award in the Most Innovative category at the Marketing Derby Food and Drink Awards.
Operations Director Max Poynton said: “We could never beat the award success we had in 2021, but to be shortlisted in the Baking Industry Awards is a real honour – in our trade it’s the equivalent of the Oscars.
“It’s particularly pleasing to be nominated in the online category because we thought this would be a short-term measure to get us through the pandemic, but in fact it has been the catalyst for the success and expansion of Project D.
“It’s testament to our ever-growing team that we have been able to impress the judges and we all have our fingers crossed that we may bring home another award – although we may need a bigger shelf at this rate!”
The Baking Industry Awards recognise and celebrate the transformation of the industry, over the past year, and acknowledge the skills, creativity and business acumen of bakery businesses and the baking sector.
The awards have been running for more than three decades, celebrating the best the baking industry has to offer.
In the online category Project D is up against Lottie Shaw’s a Yorkshire-based bakery producing traditional baked goods and Lovingly Artisan, based in the Lake District, which delivers sourdough loaves.
