Independent Karratha bakery to open next week

Karratha's first independent bakery in years is set to open in the CBD on Monday.

A new venture from the team behind Exmouth's popular Ningaloo Bakehouse, the Pilbara Bakehouse will sell pies, pastries and fresh bread from a bakery-cafe shopfront at 14 Hedland Place.

The retail opening comes just weeks after the business began wholesale trading of baked goods made at its commercial kitchen in the Karratha light industrial area.

Owner Laurie Miller said there was a niche for an independent bakery in the region.

“I could see that there was a need in Karratha, and in the whole Pilbara, to create a really good bakery which bakes 100 per cent of its products — and not just bread but also lots of pies and pastries — and provides fresh bread to areas in the Pilbara which currently don't have access to fresh bread,” he said.

“There’s also just this whole excitement about being part of a different community as well.”

The Pilbara Bakehouse is based on the same model as its Exmouth counterpart, and all of its products will be freshly baked.

Mr Miller also plans to distribute fresh bread to Hedland and some fly-in, fly-out camps in the near future, and possibly to inland Pilbara towns subject to demand.

He said he hoped the bakery would attract more tourists to stop by Karratha on their travels.

“I like to think... the Pilbara Bakehouse will not just be exciting for locals but for people visiting as well — that they’ll get to hear about it as they're travelling up and down North West Coastal Highway and will say ‘let’s go to Karratha and get a pie’,” he said.

About 30 people, most of whom are residents, have been employed at the business.