Start Your Own Food Business on the Cheap

One of the most sensible businesses to start is a food business because people will always need to eat, no matter what. You will need to do a few things before starting your food business to define your niche and truly understand it. The best business type fills a gap, so you should identify the voids in the food businesses around the locality you intend to serve.

Once you’ve determined what food type your focus will be, you’re ready to start setting things into motion. Let’s look at some of the major obligations you will have to consider before starting your food business.

Sourcing Fresh Ingredients

If there’s one thing you want to avoid, like the plague, it is getting slammed with lawsuits due to food poisoning. Therefore, it is vital that you find a source of fresh ingredients that can meet your menu, quality, quantity, and delivery timelines. Fresh ingredients are about the biggest factor in making or breaking any food business. The freshness level will ultimately alter your food flavour, directly impacting your customers and whether they will opt for your services frequently.

Equipment & Licensing

Food preparation requires high levels of hygiene, space, and sanitation. You will be required to get a food handlers certificate in order to follow the code. Looking for an outlet that will offer you sufficient facilities may mean a different location from your intended customer base. This may prove to be a hindrance, and more costly on delivery logistics. Consider hiring a commercial kitchen. It has so many added benefits like advanced equipment that is well maintained, and it comes at an affordable cost. Renting a commercial kitchen takes away the headache of acquiring licensing, catering for equipment maintenance and repair, putting into place the required fire prevention and protection protocols, ensuring pest control, and organizing for refuse disposal. These are just some of the benefits that come with hiring a kitchen. 

For more information, you can check out what Occupyd has to offer. They are one of the most renowned suppliers of commercial kitchens. Hiring will be more cost-effective and convenient as you start your food business. You won’t need to invest in an oven, freezer, and other large, costly equipment vital to your food business.

Minimizing Wastage

Food preparation has huge risks when it comes to wastage. You can never quite tell the quantity of sales you will make in any given day, unless you have been requested to cater to a specific number. Knowing the right amounts to prepare daily will require a great deal of research, combined with your menu type, locality, and food distribution system. Research is important. It will help you estimate what quantities of food to prepare at the onset, as you gradually increase based on the demand. To ensure you at least reach a break-even point for the first few weeks, ensure you minimize your wastage by not preparing too much food. You’ll also need to find an adequate way of disposing of leftovers. Suppose you’re doing an amazing job in food preparation, marketing, and delivery. In that case, you’ll be making profits in no time, with minimal wastage.

Business Model & Distribution

As a start-up, select a business model that will not require huge overheads. For example, you may want to consider doing home and office deliveries instead of the standard brick and mortar setup. The latter will cost you considerably on rents and deposits. Another important factor to consider is your distribution model. Are you waiting for customers to come to you, or are you going to them? With the global occurrences of the last year, where house arrest has since become the norm, you will likely find a lot of business opportunities in home deliveries. Plus, with the social distancing rules still in effect, you will require a very large space if you opted to offer sit-in services.

In Summary

Starting a food business is not as expensive as it may purportedly seem. Provided you weigh your options objectively. Also, remember that each region and country have varied food regulations and licensing criteria. You could be subject to additional laws for some sectors, such as the alcohol industry. Be sure to contact a lawyer and the local authority for specific information that may affect you legally before starting your food business, as there might be additional costs to consider.