Oprah spikes sales of Swedish bread

STOCKHOLM, Sweden --A Swedish crisp bread maker has seen its U.S. sales rise by 50 percent after Oprah Winfrey sunk her teeth into its crackers on her talk show, a company spokeswoman said Friday.

Winfrey was airing a lifestyle program about food and health on Jan. 15 when she pulled out a box of Wasa Crisp Bread, Sweden's biggest producer of the traditional rye bread, and made herself a sandwich.

"My U.S. colleagues called us the day after and just cheered," Wasa spokeswoman Karin Nilsson Malmen said. "Within one week of the show, we could see that U.S. sales had risen by 25 percent, and now it is up by more than 50 percent."

Wasa had nothing to do with show, Nilsson Malmen said, but added it was very happy about the promotion and that it had sent a letter of thanks to Winfrey.

In 2005, Wasa had U.S. sales of about 100 million kronor ($14 million). The company is owned by Italy's Barilla Group.