history

George Briant Ltd was founded in Christchurch in 1964 by George & Doris Briant to supply bakery and food service ingredients, equipment, and cake decorations to the bakery & butchery trade.

Through the passion, innovation, expert industry knowledge, key relationships and family values, the company performed well and moved to Auckland. It was here where George Briant chose the new company name, Golden Bridge Marketing Ltd which means “Safe Retreat” whilst maintaining the use of his initials, GB which is something that remains in our business today.

The second generation, Steve Briant joined the company in 1982 to take the company to the next stage of growth. Steve re-focussed the company into bakery & cake decorating products and launched our first consumer brand, Golden Day into the retail market with our first big win getting our products into Kmart in 1985.

Mike Briant, the third generation joined the company in 2006 straight out of high school to try and save some money to go on his OE. Starting off in the warehouse picking & packing orders he gained a real interest in finding efficiencies operationally through managing people and utilising technology.

With the expanding interest of baking & cake decorating it was identified that we needed new “face” for this part of the company. GoBake was officially launched in 2011 to provide baking & cake decorating products, brands and creative solutions for retail and commercial markets.

In light of the GoBake branded becoming well known it is decided to officially change our company name to GoBake Ltd and move in to our new support office on the beautiful Hibiscus Coast in Auckland, New Zealand. With an amazing team, clear strategic direction we are excited to celebrate our over 50 year history while we continue to work on the next 50 years. Come along for our journey!

GoBake continues to grow throughout the market in Australia including shipping more than 30 FCL containers into the market. Expansion into the Australian market continues to be a major focus whilst also remaining fully committed to our home market of New Zealand.

Mike Briant officially becomes Managing Director completing the succession from his father, Steve Briant who had been in this role for over 30 years. Mike is committed to continuing the family tradition to help further steer the team towards achieving our goals well into the future.

Mad Ingredients is born. We start a new company based in Australia, manufacturing Flavours and Food Colours and Specialty Ingredients to leading Food, Beverage, and Bakery manufacturers & distributors throughout the World.

Following the global effects of COVID-19, GoBake makes the decision early to “F the C Word” and front foot these challenging times. This includes changing Third-Party Logistics provider to deliver a service we are proud of, launching our new Wholesale E-commerce Platform and employing two new roles to help us manage our significant growth and much more.

We discover our BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) to help further strengthen and align to our Winning Aspirations for the future. We are committing to be a part of 1 billion sweet moments in 1 year by 2030 and are on track to achieve 50 million sweet moments in 1 year for FY21. Only 950 million more to achieve in the same period by 2030.

Acquisition of Carroll Industries, a New Zealand based business specialising in manufacturing, and supplying sprinkles, toppings, and ingredient inclusions to companies in the baking, ice cream and confectionery industries throughout New Zealand, Australia, and the Pacific Islands.

Be the solution, not the pollution. Introduction of our new Sustainability and Environment Policy including; we are committed to the ongoing reduction of our environmental footprint, we work proactively responding to global sustainability issues and sustainable practices are embedded in the way we work and play.

Launch of our new brand ~ Eco Origin. Environmentally friendly Bakery Packaging. Taking the hassle out of doing the right thing for our planet. Our products include Piping Bags, Cake Boxes, Baking Cups, Muffin Wraps, Cake Boards and more.

A key group of our wider team complete a full day and ongoing sessions to review and confirm our new core values. These values help shape the expected behaviours within our business and is our recipe for how we do things around here.

Acquisition of Brand Expand and Rub Hub providing an exciting new offer of BBQ Rubs, Sauces and Gift Sets into new wholesale markets and E-commerce. Includes local and international brands such as Lone Star, Al Brown, Rufus Teague, Hoff & Pepper, and more.

Steve and Helen both retire from the business after 40+ years of service!

To better align our name with who we are, what we do, and why we do it – We officially change our name to Sweet Moments Group and complete a full re brand across our business including introducing “The Sprinkle Factory” for the recently acquired Carroll Industries business. Maintaining the initials from three generations including, Steve, Mike, and George.

We achieve over 500 tonne annual capacity at The Sprinkle Factory more than tripling the original annual output when the business was acquired in May 2021.

Acquisition of Chocolate Brown and The Remarkable Chocolate Co. brings an exciting range of specialty chocolates into our offering. These premium brands deliver handcrafted, artisan chocolate collections made to cater to everyone’s tastes.