The grab-and-go business is pretty sweet for leading bakeries such as The Eli’s Cheesecake Company, based in Chicago.

Eli’s individually wrapped cheesecakes and desserts, including the Dipper cheesecake-on-a-stick, are driving higher sales in the retail and foodservice sectors. Eli’s continues to introduce creative flavors to its single-serve cheesecake line, including the new salted caramel, as well as pumpkin. Eli’s offers 10 flavors of single-serve cheesecakes and desserts.

The Cheesecake Factory Bakery is joining in the trend in a big way with the introduction of single cheesecake slices in three flavors: original, raspberry swirl, and Belgian chocolate.

New flavor options drive increased purchases, as well as special promotions. The Cheesecake Factory recently celebrated its favorite holiday of the year, National Cheesecake Day, by offering dine-in guests any slice of its more than 30 flavors of cheesecake for half price on July 30. The Cheesecake Factory also introduced its newest flavor, pineapple upside-down cheesecake.

Pineapple upside-down cheesecake is The Cheesecake Factory’s delightful twist on a classic: creamy pineapple cheesecake with maraschino cherry swirl between two layers of moist buttery pineapple upside-down cake. For every slice sold through February 2020, The Cheesecake Factory will donate 25 cents to Feeding America, the nation’s largest organization dedicated to fighting domestic hunger through a network of food banks.

Since 2008, The Cheesecake Factory has donated more than $4.6 million to Feeding America through the sale of its specially designated cheesecakes.

“National Cheesecake Day has become an annual tradition at The Cheesecake Factory that we look forward to celebrating all year,” says David Overton, founder and CEO of The Cheesecake Factory Incorporated. “Along with offering any slice, half price to our dine-in guests, we are so pleased to mark the occasion by introducing our new Pineapple Upside-Down Cheesecake on National Cheesecake Day.”

A number of bakeries are witnessing steady growth in the cheesecake sector, including convenience packaging.

Chuckanut Bay Foods, bakers of gourmet cheesecakes and other desserts, recently doubled its production capacity by moving to a new facility in Blaine, Washington. The 20,000-square-foot production facility offers Chuckanut Bay Foods twice as much space as it had in nearby Ferndale, Washington, according to Matthew Roth, the company’s president.

With an average 25% annual growth since 2008, Chuckanut Bay Foods now has 120 employees and products sold in more than 7,000 stores in the United States and Canada. Chuckanut Bay Foods makes cheesecake in multiple sizes, including petites that are perfect as appetizers and single serve for 1-2 to share.

“We produce under our name as well as private label and also have a large set of customers that we are making unique, proprietary desserts for,” Roth says. “These range from cheesecakes to cakes and brownies.”

Planning for future expansion is important for a company seeing sales grow like grass during a wet spring. When Roth and wife Julie purchased Chuckanut Cheesecake in 2008 with partners David and Sharon Loeppky and Jim and Jean Gibson, it had been in business for more than 15 years and was selling cheesecakes to Haggen grocery stores and some restaurants. “We rebranded the company as Chuckanut Bay Foods and the main product became Chuckanut Bay Cheesecake, an all-natural cheesecake with many ingredients from the farms and dairies of the Pacific Northwest,” Roth says.