BOSTON — Wildgrain is making the hunt for baked foods formulated with clean ingredients easier with its direct-to-consumer business model. Co-founded by Ismail and Johanna Salhi, Wildgrain is a subscription-based baked foods company that delivers frozen, ready-to-bake bread, pastas, pastries and more directly to consumers’ homes.
The company was established in 2020 after Ismail, who also is chief executive officer, noticed a surge of consumers — including his family — shifting away from commercial baked foods toward artisanal bread from local bakeries.
“There’s a lot of things that people noticed with the artisanal process and the old way of doing things,” Ismail said. “So, they started coming back to it and we were right on top of that (with Wildgrain) when it started happening.”
Ismail and Johanna received funding for Wildgrain from Bolt, a venture capital firm.
“I’m eternally grateful for them because they invested in Wildgrain when my wife was eight-and-a-half months pregnant,” Ismail said. “Neither of us had worked in the food space before, but we love food a lot.”
Ismail Salhi.
| Photo: WildgrainOver the years, new trends have emerged, such as transitioning to using unenriched flours or shifting away from seed oils in favor of olive oil and Wildgrain has adapted, Ismail said.
“We have a very tight feedback loop with our customers who are big carb eaters,” Ismail said. “We ship boxes of carbs monthly to customers who go through them pretty quickly, and so we are very close to the most important customers in the baked goods business and we’re listening to what they want.”
Wildgrain offers several subscription options and baked products to its members. They may choose between a 4, 6 and 12 item box size. Then, members may choose from an Italian, gluten-free, plant-based or variety box that includes a selection of bread, pastries, pastas, sauces, butters and more. Boxes range from $69 to $189.
With each membership sold, four meals are donated to The Greater Boston Food Bank.
Wildgrain’s products are formulated with ingredients perceived as clean and are free from shelf stabilizers, Ismail said.
Wildgrain partners with over 45 small bakeries across the country to fulfill orders for more than 80,000 active subscribers. The company ships everywhere in the United States except for Hawaii and Alaska.
“Our business model doesn’t work without subscriptions,” Ismail said. “We work with a lot of small artisanal bakeries that require a lot of planning and volume prediction to tell them how much bread they need to make for us and prep it and be ready for the volume we offer them.”
Johanna develops each of Wildgrain’s formulations. The formulations are then shared with partner bakeries that bake the products locally. Establishing a partnership with a bakery is taken very seriously at Wildgrain. Each must be onboarded and trained in the company’s processes, including ingredient selection and packaging for e-commerce.
Wildgrain has a full-time staff of 12 who use an in-house computer system designed by Ismail, who has a PhD in computer science to manage orders and subscribers.
“I think our biggest strength … to manage all of these subscribers with a small team is having this layer of tech that helps our team really be on top of the issues and any challenges that we have,” Ismail said.
Wildgrain’s persistence in staying on top of trends is paying — literally. In 2023, the company generated $31 million in sales, ultimately leading the company to become profitable for the first time since its start in 2020. In 2024, sales grew significantly, Ismail said.
Now that the company has achieved profitability, the founders have a clear goal.
“Our real goal is to become America’s online bakery inclusive of all diets,” Ismail said. “Whoever in your family has any type of dietary restrictions, we will have amazing, delicious artisanal products for them that have clean ingredients and tastes way better than what you would find at the grocery store.”
Ismail said a keto line from Wildgrain will be launching later this year.
