Every year, as July slowly draws to a close, Mark Dingler—baker and head of infrastructure—pulls a very special cookie cutter from the drawer: the Swiss cross. It takes center stage just once a year, when Bertschi Bakery prepares its traditional 1 August Weggen. No fewer than 50,000 times, Mark and his colleagues press the cross-shaped cutter into the dough—entirely by hand, as there’s no machine for this task. Once cut, he quickly places the Swiss crosses onto the round dough pieces. Speed matters: in the 28-degree Celsius bakery, the dough can’t get too warm or the crosses risk losing their perfect shape.

But it’s not just the form that reflects Swiss tradition—it’s the ingredients, too. The bakery relies exclusively on locally sourced products, like the massive block of Appenzeller butter that Mark proudly showcases before mixing it into the dough.

From the bakery window facing south, Markus Brantner, Managing Director at Bertschi, watches planes descend toward Zurich Airport. Every now and then, one flies past with a red tailfin and a white cross. Each aircraft carries the rolls that he and his team at Bertschi Bakery knead, shape, glaze and bake by hand. "When a SWISS aircraft flies past the bakery and I know it’s carrying our bread rolls—shaped just a few days earlier—it’s always an emotional moment that fills me with pride," Markus says. Day in, day out, they produce between 15,000 and 20,000 rolls for SWISS—each one eaten within 24 hours. For Bertschi, that’s all in a day’s work. After all, SWISS has been a loyal partner for many years.