For several bakery factory owners across Bengal, this Christmas and New Year season is no cakewalk.

Reason: prices of most raw materials such as dry and fresh yeast, whipped cream, chocolate, jelly, sugar, flour, refined oil, margarine, cream and eggs have shot up by 10 per cent to 30 per cent this festive season.

“Last year the price of a 200-gram fruit cake was Rs 50, which now I am forced to sell at Rs 75. As the incomes of many people have shrivelled owing to the pandemic, the rise in the prices of cakes and cookies isn’t going down well with customers,” said Sajal Dey, owner of Cakes & Snacks at Chittaranjan in West Burdwan.

Before the pandemic, Dey would sell cakes and cookies worth around Rs 1 lakh per day. “I am not able to sell cakes worth Rs 40,000 to Rs 30,000 per day now,” he said.

Dey had to reduce manpower by half since last year. “Earlier I had 45 employees but now I have only 20,” he said.

Another bakery owner, Atanu Kumar Das of Haldia town, said he lost business by half this year because of the rise in the prices of raw materials and fuel.

“Transport cost has increased because of the hike in fuel rates and so our business has been hit. People want cakes for cheap, which we are unable to provide. I used to sell cakes worth Rs 4 lakh a month during the Christmas-New Year season but this year it has been reduced to half,” said Atanu Kumar Das of Bidyut Bakery.

Debasish Das, the business development executive (east) of a Kerala-based raw materials supply chain for bakeries, said the prime business season of bakery products is Christmas-New Year. “We earn most of our annual revenue during this festive season but I am not getting adequate orders,” he said.

Debasish Das pointed out the extent of inflation. In 2020, the price of refined oil was Rs 1,660 per 15kg container but it is selling now for Rs 2,060. An egg that sold for Rs 4.40 last year is now priced at Rs 6. The price of bakery fat was Rs 1,960 per 14kg container last year but now costs Rs 2,360.

“Prices of raw materials of bakery products have suddenly increased in the past two weeks,” said Debasish Das.

The owner of two bakery factories in Bankura, Nabendu Singha, said the demand for one-pound cakes and heavier cakes was almost zero. “Most of the cakes we are selling now are small and within half-a-pound. People are avoiding bigger cakes because of the price,” he said.

Sources said Bengal had some 4,500 bakeries that give jobs and livelihood to around 10 lakh people.

“The big ones are somehow managing but local and small bakeries have been hit hard. Many small bakeries have already closed since the pandemic last year,” said Ismail Hossain, secretary of the West Bengal Bakers’ Co-ordination Committee and owner of Paradise Bakery at Sodepur in North 24-Parganas.