Ethics in practice
Ethical Choices Transform Family Business into
International Brand
Even as a young girl growing up in Paris, Apollonia always knew
what she wanted to do when she grew up: take over the family
business. But she didn’t anticipate how quickly this would happen.
When her father, Lionel Poilâne, and mother died in a helicopter
crash in 2002, France lost its most celebrated baker, and Apollonia
stepped into the role. She was just 18 years old at the time with
plans to matriculate to Harvard in the fall, but the moment her
parents had prepared her for had come. As her Harvard admissions
essay said, “The work of several generations is at stake.”
With organization and determination, Apollonia
managed one of the best French bakeries in the world, based in
Paris—from her apartment in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She would
usually wake up an extra two hours before classes to make sure she
could make all the phone calls for work. “After classes I check on
any business regarding the company and then do my homework,” she
says. “Before I go to bed I call my production manager in Paris to
check the quality of the bread.” Because the name Poilâne has
earned a place with a very small group of prestige bakers, the
18-year-old was determined to continue the tradition of customer
satisfaction and quality her grandfather established in 1932. When
her grandfather suffered a stroke in 1973, his 28-year-old son,
Lionel, poured his heart into the business and made the family
bread into the global brand it is today. Lionel opened two more
bakeries in Paris and another in London. He developed and nurtured
a worldwide network of retailers and celebrities where bread is
shipped daily via FedEx to upscale restaurants and wealthy clients
around the world.
Experimenting with sourdough is what distinguished Poilâne’s
products from bread produced by Paris’s other bakers, and it has
remained the company’s signature product. It is baked with a “P”
carved into the crust, a throwback to the days when the use of
communal ovens forced bakers to identify their loaves, and it also
ensures that the loaf doesn’t burst while it’s baking. Today,
Poilâne also sells croissants, pastries, and a few specialty
breads, but the company’s signature item is still the four-pound
miche, a wheel of sourdough, a country bread, pain Poilâne.
“Apollonia is definitely passionate about her job,” says Juliette
Sarrazin, manager of the successful Poilâne Bakery in London. “She
really believes in the work of her father and the company, and she
is looking at the future, which is very good.”
Apollonia’s work ethic and passion fueled her drive even when she
was a student. Each day presented a juggling act of new problems to
solve in Paris while other Harvard students slept. As Apollonia
told a student reporter from The Harvard Crimson, “The one or two
hours you spend procrastinating I spend working. It’s nothing
demanding at all. It was always my dream to run the company.”
Her dedication paid off, and Apollonia retained control of
important decisions, strategy, and business goals, describing
herself as the “commander of the ship,” determining the company’s
overall direction. Today, Poilâne is an $18 million business that
employs 160 people. Poilâne runs three restaurants called Cuisine
de Bar in Paris and in London, serving casual meals such as soups,
salads, and open-faced tartines. The company ships more than
200,000 loaves a year to clients in 20 countries, including the
United States, Japan, and Saudi Arabia. “More people understand
what makes the quality of the bread, what my father spent years
studying, so I am thrilled about that,” says Apollonia.