Behind Closed Doors Freedom Bakery

Giving people a second chance at life is the driving force behind this artisan breadmaker with a difference

- Catherine Coyle

It has only just passed its first birthday, but already Freedom Bakery has a reputation for producing some of the best artisan bread in Scotland. You can buy its loaves and pastries from delis around Glasgow and the central belt, but it also supplies many top restaurants and popular cafes. What most buyers don’t realise, though, is that their sourdough or croissant was probably made by a former prisoner

“It all started in a prison kitchen,” recalls Freedom’s founder, Matt Fountain. “The idea was to open a bakery café, offering prisoners jobs after release.” This kernel of an idea grew and changed and, after a period of raising funds and researching both the viability of a wholesale bakery and the social justice system in Scotland, Freedom properly began life in a floury industrial unit in the heart of Springburn, just north of Glasgow city centre. It has flourished largely through word-of-mouth, and it’s the quality of what it makes, more so than its status as a social enterprise, that makes its loaves and pastries sell out fast – people buy this stuff because it tastes so good, not simply because they want to support a worthwhile cause.