KANSAS CITY — To drive revenue and boost throughput, bakeries are extending production runs and sometimes testing the limits on how long they can operate between scheduled downtime. As a result, many sanitation departments are getting the short end of the broomstick.

Remember when direct-store delivery bakeries regularly shut down their lines on Tuesdays and Saturdays for cleaning and maintenance? As five-day production weeks grow to six and seven, two days a week have become one day or even one shift for sanitation. Often deep cleaning occurs overnight or on weekends, which makes it more difficult to attract high-performing hires to do the work. Such changes in attitudes also are altering the dynamics for bakery support departments.

“Gone are the days of dedicated sanitation crews,” said Karl Thorson, global food safety and sanitation manager, General Mills, Minneapolis, in Baking & Snack’s October sanitation report. “We have some small crews that are doing environmental, peripheral-type cleaning, but most of the cleaning is being done by the operations team, and that gives us the ultimate flexibility.”

One way to improve efficiency is to share the load when it comes to sanitation.

“It’s important to stress that only ‘sanitation’ is the responsibility of the sanitation staffing,” said Nathan Mirdamadi, food safety manager, Commercial Food Sanitation, an Intralox company. “Cleaning and housekeeping are the responsibility of everyone, and a key piece is having a departmental ‘hand-off’ process, including documentation with clear expectations and accountability.”

With only so many hours in a day, bakeries need to get everyone involved and smartly coordinate scheduling to ensure they can maximize throughput while keeping their houses in order.