Philly Pretzel Factory Readies Production for National Pretzel Day Giveaway

It all begins at 2 a.m., while most of Bryn Mawr sleeps.

Sacks of milled flour lining the green and white checkered wall of the Philly Pretzel Factory are combined with yeast, dough conditioner and water in giant mixers. Then, the machine known as “the stringer” does its work rolling out long, thin fingers of pretzel dough one after the other in a hypnotizing fashion.

This process will have to function at double the usual capacity on the morning of April 26, when Philly Pretzel Factory of Bryn Mawr, one of the original three locations out of the more than 100 such shops that exist today, will give every person who walks in the door a free pretzel in celebration of National Pretzel Day.

“We’re going to give out thousands and thousands of pretzels,” said Marty Ferrill, vice president of operations for Philly Pretzel Factory.

This will be the fourth year that the company has celebrated the national holiday. Part of the plan is to attract new customers—people who wander in at the promise of something free. The other goal is to reward Philly Pretzel Factory’s current customer base.

After the strips of dough come out of the stringer, they are in the hands of the twisters—pretzel artisans of sorts who put a personal touch on the Philly Pretzel Factory product, spinning it into its trusted shape.

“It’s actually pretty easy,” said Bill Bunting, general manager at the Bryn Mawr location. “It’s just like throwin’ a lasso. A good twister can throw 30 pretzels in a minute.”

The company holds a contest every year to determine the fastest twister. The current record is 117 pretzels in three minutes, according to Bunting.

Twisters can also form the dough into custom letters and shapes—puzzle pieces for Autism Awareness or crosses for the upcoming Communion season, to name a few.

Next to the cash register sits the colorful “Dip Zone” display, a Philly Pretzel Factory highlight that allows patrons to customize their pretzels with an array of palatable offerings: yellow mustard, honey mustard, spicy brown mustard, hot mustard, ketchup, chocolate dip, butter cream, cinnamon dip or cream cheese.

Philly Pretzel Factory of Bryn Mawr is the largest provider of soft pretzels in the area. They supply ACME markets, Main Line Health Systems and Villanova University, among other local institutions.

And pretzels aren’t all they do.

The Bryn Mawr location just added water ice to its list of product offerings, and the company has been busy promoting its Philly cheesesteak pretzel and buffalo chicken cheesesteak pretzel.

It turns out that all those free pretzels that the company will distribute on Tuesday, April 26 won’t put them in the red by any means. People who come in usually end up making a purchase.

“We do a halfway decent day sales-wise,” Ferrill said.