CRANBURY, N.J. — Fritsch USA, Cranbury, opened its new showroom and testing center in May, further exemplifying this global company’s dedication to the North American market.

“The mission of our innovation center is to offer smaller to mid-sized bakeries a good opportunity to do testing and product development within the U.S. on our state-of-the-art equipment, such as reversible dough sheeters of different sizes, makeup lines or croissant coilers,” said Patrick Nagel, technical department, sales, customer service, Fritsch USA.

This is the first facility of its kind for Fritsch in North America, although the company has a larger center in Europe for mid-size to large bakeries around the world. The European Technology Centre in Kitzingen, Germany, features 4,600 square feet of space, hosts more than 1,000 customers per year and offers 20 technologists to assist bakers.

Fritsch welcomed more than 30 people for the North American facility’s grand opening and has been hosting customers for the past few months. The 300-square-foot sanitary center allows guests to work with Fritsch professionals on four different types of reversible dough sheeters, along with cutting tables, makeup tables, croissant coilers and filling units. There is also a Revent oven and an Escher spiral mixer.

“We offer our clients a warm and welcoming environment in our test center,” Mr. Nagel said.

At the grand opening, Fritsch experts showcased the Rollfix 700 dough sheeting line, which can reduce pie dough, brioche and lavash dough to 0.3 mm. The event also featured demonstrations for producing cream cheese-filled brioche swirls and proofing and baking methods. The Rollfix 700 features a larger roller gap (up to 50 mm) that allows for bigger dough batches. Guests can also test production of phyllo doughs on this large line. With a new intuitive operating concept and simple user guidance, Fritsch engineers can walk customers through the 18 sheeting programs available for every dough type. Additionally, up to 100 product recipes can be stored on the system, which is easily managed on a 10-inch touchscreen.

“The Rollfix 700 is one of our most versatile machines, and we are excited to showcase it at this facility,” Mr. Nagel said.

The 700 is the larger version of the Rollfix 600, another automatic sheeting process that keeps dough at a constant thickness to improve the uniformity of the products.

Mr. Nagel said the roller gap adjustment feature reduces processing times and improves efficiency.

Smaller bakeries wanting to test products on Fritsch sheeting lines can learn how to use the Rollfix Mini at the test center. The Mini is an option for operations with limited space, Mr. Nagel said, and attracts smaller bakeries from around North America looking to produce accurate dough sheets. When folded up for storage, it takes up just 780 by 950 mm (30.7 by 37.4 inches). Even in operation with 50 cm tables (19.6 inches), it works on 1.5 square meters (4.9 square feet) of floor space.

Mr. Nagel said the new center also showcases a cutting table that bakers can test with all dough types. Bakers have access to an array of sheeting and cutting machines for producing a wide variety of products, including apple turnovers, croissants, Danish, donuts and pizzas.

Additionally, Fritsch staff is on hand to teach bakers looking to increase production or maximize efficiency.

“We offer education on operation of Fritsch equipment, testing of new products and ideas our customers bring to us, and demonstrations of products that we can manufacture on or with our machinery,” Mr. Nagel said.

The North American innovation center allows bakers — regardless of whether they want to bring a new product to market, modify a production process, install a new production line or adapt a traditional process to an industrial one — to find a process that works for their individual needs.