A frequent Greggs shopper who has been timing their visits to the bakery chain has found the ‘sweet spot’ time of day when bakes and pizza slices are at their freshest
There’s an ideal time of day to visit Greggs for warm bakes (stock photo)(Image: Getty)
Popping into Greggs for a sausage roll can be a bit of a gamble unless you know this handy timing trick.
We all love a Greggs, but if you’re a regular patron of the bakery chain, you’ll know that timing your visit just right is paramount to ensure your sausage roll, bake, or pizza slice is nice and hot. Greggs makes fresh batches of hot pastry items throughout the day, but they are not kept hot once they go on the shelves, so if you arrive too late, you could be served a lukewarm bake that’s nowhere near as nice.
But what is the best time to visit Greggs if you want your food hot? One food fan on social media has done the calculations and now claims to have found the best time to visit for “fresh” food with plenty of choice.
In a post on the Greggs Reddit forum, one person wrote: “Started timing my Greggs visits and it actually made a noticeable difference, anyone else do this? I used to just walk into Greggs whenever I was nearby and hope for the best, but recently I started paying attention to timing.
“Going earlier in the day, especially mid-morning, the food is usually fresher, and there’s more choice available. A couple of times, I went later in the afternoon and noticed things were either sold out or not quite as fresh. It’s a small thing, but it changed the overall experience more than I expected. Now I plan it slightly instead of just popping in randomly.”
And people in the comments agreed with the poster. One person even managed to put an actual timeframe on it, saying the “sweet spot” is between 10:45 and 11:30 in the morning.
They said: “10:45 to 11:30 is the sweet spot. Fresh pizza at 11. Breakfast stops, so the bakes are all fresh.”
The original poster then replied: “That actually lines up with what I’ve noticed without really thinking about it. It’s like that awkward in-between where breakfast is gone, but lunch hasn’t been picked over yet.”
One Greggs employee also replied to the post with more information, explaining the optimal time to visit actually depends on what it is you want to buy.
They shared: “If you want very fresh cakes, come first thing in the morning! Yum yums are nice and soft, the glazing on them isn’t hardened, and the icing on the doughnuts is nice and moist too.
“For bakes, when you see there’s less than three or four of an item, that’s when we put in a fresh batch, so stick around for a good 20 minutes, usually takes a bit less than that if you’d like your bake fresh out of the oven. Hot sausage rolls are different; we have many batches ready at all times unless it is absolutely manic. In my eyes, the busier the shop is, the hotter your sausage rolls will be. I’ll just leave it at that if it’s any help.”
Greggs doesn’t keep their pastry items hot at all times because it actually helps to keep their prices lower. In the UK, a value-added tax (VAT) is applied to hot takeaway food, while meals that have cooled down or are served cold are exempt from this rule. This means if Greggs were to keep their sausage rolls and other baked goods hot after they’d been cooked, they would need to charge this tax, meaning we would pay more for the products.
“As bakers, we believe that baking our savouries fresh each day gives customers the best quality product. If the sausage rolls and bakes were kept hot after they had been baked, then they would be subject to VAT and the customer would have to be charged a higher price, in the same way that we charge VAT on our hot sandwiches, which are kept in a heated cabinet and are subject to VAT.”
