Fourth generation master baker Jason Geary is a humble man – he never wanted to be the name and face of an incredibly successful bread brand or star in a national TV campaign.
But six years after the launch of Jason’s Sourdough, he’s exactly that – the man at the forefront of Britain’s third biggest bread brand. In fairness, Geary never set out to create a brand which would overtake the likes of Jacksons, Roberts, or indeed Kingsmill, he just wanted to make great bread.
“When we launched the brand, I wasn’t sitting there going I want to get into the top five, four, or three bread brands,” he tells British Baker. “It was always about quality. That is my driver.”
This could be seen during a walk around the newest factory at Glenfield, Leicestershire. While a confident person in the boardroom, Geary’s passion really comes to life on the factory floor as he stood over vats of bubbling sourdough at different stages of maturity, even darting off to correct one Majestic Malted loaf which had emerged from the oven upside down.
It’s an accumulation of “years and years” working in the business, he explains, starting with the teenager who entered and won national competitions. Back then his passion for flavour and quality meant using the sponge and dough method to develop flavourful loaves, and further down the line the business embraced sourdough cultures for the same purpose, even if they were used in soft bloomers rather than sourdough loaves at the time.
The launch of the aptly named Jason’s Sourdough brand in 2020 put sourdough front and centre and helped the business branch out from being “basically solely reliant on Aldi”. The discounter and manufacturer still have a great relationship, although the scales have now tipped in the brand’s favour which accounts for roughly 55% of Geary’s Bakeries revenue.
Latest annual sales for Jason’s Sourdough currently sit at £165m [Nielsen w/e 8 August 2026] with “plenty of headroom for growth”.
But this is just the start, particularly as Jason’s Sourdough is aiming to more than double the brand retail sales value again by 2030. “It is a push,” Geary notes, “but I think it is realistic.”
“From day one to where we are now, we’ve not shortened the process. It’s still the same”
Recent growth has partly come from increased capacity as a result of the investment in the new Glenfield site, a move which also allowed Jason’s to massively increase distribution. Over the past year it has gone from 3,500 distribution points to 6,500 – a number which was significantly bolstered by the convenience channel with Tesco Express and Booker coming on board.
“It’s a snowball effect,” he adds. “People are buying more artisanal and craft products – it’s the same across a lot of categories. For us, it started quite a few years back, where people were getting into higher-quality bread, more health-conscious bread and the snowball is getting bigger and bigger.”
Social media hype and Jason’s first-ever multi-million TV campaign also helped, even if Geary prefers life off camera. He admits, though, that he found the advert easier than the brand’s Breaducation videos because he didn’t have to speak. However, it reaffirmed to fans that just like Jonathan Warburton, Jason Geary is a real person.
Speaking of the UK’s largest bread brand, Geary is actually very complimentary of his competitors praising the quality of the products they’re putting out, although he laughs: “I can assure you the Warburtons advert cost a lot more than ours”.
But with so much turbulence in the market over the past few years – from Roberts Bakery and Brace’s Bakery being rescued from administration by Boparan Private Office to the creation of Hovis Bakeries from the Hovis/Allied merger, plus the sale of Rathbones to Warburtons – it’s important not to lose focus. Particularly when it comes to the sourdough market, Geary believes you can’t create a sourdough loaf with the traditional plant bread mindset which is centred around speed and high volumes. “It’s a completely different thing,” he says.
“From day one to where we are now, we’ve not shortened the process. It’s still the same,” Geary adds. “This is one of the things that I make sure that we never ever deviate from what we’re doing, because that’s what the brand is about.”
The temptation is certainly there. Geary notes a time recently when the development team brought something to him which didn’t align with the brand’s clean label values. “I do believe it would have sold really well,” he says, “and I pissed a few people off saying we can’t do it.
“That is always the hardest thing,” he shares. “But it shows to consumers we’re not all about sales, and money, money, money. We need to get the products right and do what’s right for the brand.”
A healthy NPD pipeline
While keeping tight lipped about future NPD, he asserts that whatever is coming down the production line for Jason’s must align with this: “We need to make it Jason’s. We need to make it sourdough. We need to make a difference.”
This mindset has resulted in the recent creation of the Fibre range, consisting of a Seeded Fibre Loaf and Every Day Seeded Fibre Rolls. Sitting under its ‘bread with benefits’ line-up, it follows in the footsteps of Jason’s Sourdough Protein Loaf which launched in April 2024 and Jason’s Every Day Seeded Protein Rolls which were added a year later.
At the time, the Protein launch felt like a leap of faith for the brand, but Geary says it’s done “really, really well” earning a permanent place in the Jason’s line-up.
Both the Protein and Fibre ranges tap into needs for multiple health-conscious consumers, from the everyday health heroes to those on GLP-1s requiring nutrient dense food in smaller portions.
Other recent NPD from the brand includes Crumpet Thins which followed hot on the heels of its Proper Sourdough Crumpets, and toasties and hot rolls which have expanded their presence beyond the foodservice realm into retail. All of these signal the brand’s ambitions to take sourdough beyond bread but ensuring it slots into everyday life for consumers.
With more NPD, another TV campaign, plus an ambitious growth target for Jason’s to work towards, there’s plenty to keep the team busy.
Despite the planned growth, Geary remains assured that the heart of the business will remain. “Bigger’s not always better. We’ve got to keep doing what we’re doing and keep up the quality.”
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