New home kitchen business - advice needed
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22-01-2023 11:00am#1
Hi,
I'm hoping for some advice please.
I'm hoping to start a small at home business. It's good based but I honestly only need my cooker, large pot, blender and fridge. So I don't want to invest in commercial kitchen.
I'm happy to purchased second fridge /freezer for storage. My Q is has anyone done this and successfully ran it from home with hse inspections etc.
I've no food experience apart from college waitressing. So haven't done good safety courses etc. But willing to once I know what's applicable.
I am also thinking on approachubg other food businesses in my area to rent their kitchen on their down time. This obviously has draw backs as to when I can work & cost. Unsure if hse accepts it.
Side note - I've ran my own business for 10 years now, did all the SYOB with Leo. I'm also due to start a food starter program with LEO in March.
I'm just hoping for practical advice from someone who has done this. Gotten hse and certified.
I recently purchased the products I want to produce from antohet business operating in Ireland, it came with nothing apart from brand logo. No ingredients, allergens etc. I don't want to fall into this area of not complying.
Thank you in advance
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I knew someone who had a small baking business. She was required to build a new kitchen, separate from the family kitchen.
I guess this was for hygiene and cross contamination reasons.
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Beware of scare stories that you need to build a factory size kitchen out the back for a small home food business with a guess at a reason.
HUNDREDS of people run small home food business from their own kitchen and the FSAI have published details of requirements to ensure you produce food that you are confident will not make anyone ill.
As the FSAI are the regulatory body for food safety you can be 100% certain of the information they provide
https://www.fsai.ie/food_businesses/starting_business/home_business_food_stall.html
You can also pop to a local farmers markets and talk to other artisan producers and see what steps they took
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You can run low risk food businesses from domestic kitchens without any modifications, however what is low risk? We don't know what product you are talking about, baking in general is considered low risk until you start using fresh cream or cream cheese or anything that must be kept refrigerated. Rules differ depending on product, jam has specific requirements, anything with meat and you could well be talking commercial stainless steel type kitchen.
Best bet is to contact the Environmental Health Officer in local HSE office and apply, they will inspect your kitchen, don't bother doing anything to it until they do as it may or may not be necessary. Some EHOs have different requirements to others, pets/washing machines in kitchen/separate hand washing sink, all can cause different issues but no one here can know or guess because we don't know area or type of business.
After you sort the HSE and register your kitchen you really need product/public liability to cover yourself and definitely if doing markets as they will require it. You should also register with Revenue but might come under amount for small extra income declaration with paye initially, take advice from them. Your house insurer should also be advised you are running a business from the premises.
The HSE is actually the most straightforward part of it and costs nothing unlike the rest!
PS just notice you are already self employed so will be registered already with revenue, ignore that bit 🙂
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Are you, or have you been in the LEO mentoring program? If not, you could apply. And LEO also give grants for start ups. We did both a few years ago and found them very helpful indeed. I've stepped back now but the business is still going strong. Sorry I can't help with the food aspect.
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Thanks for the message. I've been involved with them with my existing business. They are really helpful, so I'm hoping if this business takes off I'll be in a position to register it as a separate business. I'd then be hoping to avail of grants if I needed equipment etc.
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Guys, thanks for all of your info.
I'm hoping to start small and run from home initially and it it takes off, convert part of my current work office at home, or rent a kitchen space.
I'm hoping the Leo food starter programme will answer my Qs but the outline doesn't mention much compliance with hse, fsai so I'm unsure if it'll help in that area. So happy for any advice you guys have here. Thanks for taking the time to answer me.
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So you've written....."I'm hoping to start a small at home business. It...... I honestly only need my cooker, large pot, blender and fridge. So I don't want to invest in commercial kitchen......I'm happy to purchased second fridge /freezer for storage........I've no food experience apart from college waitressing. So haven't done good safety courses etc. But willing to once I know what's applicable"
That's not a business, it's an idea for a hobby and it's going to fail for multiple reasons. If you think waitressing is 'food experience' you have no idea. How long do you think domestic equipment would last being used commercially? Do you even own the property the kitchen is in? If you want to be taken seriously show some figures, input costs, projected turnover, percentage for wastage, depreciation , etc.
Otherwise this thread is a waste of time.
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In fairness if only using cooker/pot/blender/fridge then domestic models are going to last a long time!
Many people are running small businesses from home domestic kitchens, yes they are hardly major money makers but a bit more than just hobbies. In fact the HSE registration for many of the home baking type depend upon just using domestic kitchen and appliances, once you start buying commercial stuff then you fall under a different category of requirements.
Time enough for scaling up to all these things after the market research of testing the market is done.
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Don't listen to him OP. All businesses have to start somewhere and your kitchen is as good as place as any. Business ideas are so precious. But they are also very delicate and can be shattered at every opportunity. The two main reasons businesses fail is because you run out of cash or there's no market for your product/service, not because you're starting small. You'll only know by doing it and keeping your costs to minimum is always great advice. Remember there are only two rules in business - Do it, review it, change it and if you don't ask you won't get!
Good luck to you!
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Gloomster, You are as entitled to your view as I am. I don’t do platitudes or dreamy stuff. People who post should expect an honest answer, one that makes them think, hence I asked about costings
Why almost all [insert latest foody fad] home kitchen businesses are not a sustainable business model.
For fun look at some figures. Take the last fad – cupcakes. Ignore the fact that the product concept was a fad, with a short life and the product itself a shorter one, (Google Crumbs Bake Shop). So let’s approach cupcakes from a strictly business angle; no dreamy ideas, no capital expenditure, just a simple analysis of the economics of a home baking business model selling product on just one day a week.
Let’s assume that 200 buns could be sold in a day on a market stall. That is a big ‘ask’ because it means that in a six & a half hour day (400 minutes) one bun must be sold every 2 minutes or 50 customers must buy four buns every 8 minutes during trading hours.
The average baking tray holds 12 buns. An expensive domestic fan oven could fit & bake 3 trays at a time, that’s 36 buns per bake, repeated six times to produce 216 buns.
Assuming the operator is a competent confectioner, allow an hour per batch for prep, cook and icing/decoration time, so while the next bake is underway the icing/decoration can be done. Plus an hour for cleaning up. That’s seven hours production cost labour at (minimum wage rate) €11.30 per hour = €80.
Ingredients for 216 buns – flour, sugar, butter, eggs, flavourings, colourings, icing, toppings, cases, bags/boxes/packaging, etc. Minimum €80. Add €20 for ESB costs and depreciation of the food mixer & oven (neither are designed for heavy use on a regular basis). = €100
Assume the daily cost of a table/ stand at a market (and including petrol &parking costs for your car while there) is €100. Six hours labour on the stand is another €70 on input = €170
So, it’s a base cost of €350 for 200 cupcakes (max output would be v. good at 200 out of 216, giving a unit cost of €1.75. Taking VAT at 13.5% into account the 200 buns must be retailed at about €1.99 each just to break even. To make a profit of about €50 all must be sold at €2.25. How many will pay that amount for what essentially is just a glorified bun?
Fail to sell everything and you lose. Factor in the cost of insurance (product liability and increase in home and motor insurance for using your home as a commercial kitchen and car for commercial use) effort for HSAI Certification, a HACCP, a bit of upgrade to the standard kitchen to meet H&S requirements, time for ingredients shopping, etc. etc., and the picture gets a lot worse.
Stick with the day job Gloomster, investing in start-ups is not for you!
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Thanks Mick Tator, but you don’t know what the OP is going to make.
There used to be two regular posters here, the two Pedros they were called. Both gave very good advice but then their posts started being totally dismissive of every idea that came up. All under the guise of ‘business is tough, better to hear a few harsh words than lose all your money’.
In the end both Pedros left Boards voluntarily but they would have been eventually banned due to the vitriolic tone of most of their posts. They have not been missed.
I’ve been posting on various business fora for over 20 years and I’ve seen it happen a lot. It may be the anonymity that Internet fora allows but regardless of how right you may think you are, please try to encourage as opposed to put down.
You never know where the OP will end up after their kitchen venture. That’s the beauty of doing it, then reviewing it, then changing it. But you will only know by doing it first. If they listened to you, they wouldn’t even try.
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You are partly correct there Gloomster, I have no idea what the OP is going to make. But you miss the point, what the OP will make does not matter; it is a lack of basic business acument and plain economics – cups of soup, cups of coffee, cupcakes, whatever, the challenges and math are the same. And it’s probably from a rented property, which you overlooked to ask.
Not directed at you personally, but I’ve seen crap modding kill forums. The Business Forum, like several others on Boards, has sunk both in volume and quality of posts and responses. Previous Mods have allowed and encouraged it. You inherited a dog. Turn back the clock, look/recall, (you were around) and compare the quality/volume of posts and contributions. There was a poster here years ago, Duplo[something]. A good guy, he did the Supervalue food prep bootcamp, did it right and now has built a business that has survived for a dozen years. He gave great advice in the food sector from personal experience. His last posts, like those of another poster, Bandara (another great former contributor) seemed totally frustrated by ‘woke-ism’ and they have left/stopped posting. The Pedros did the same. The Forum has now descended to questions from dreamers about shipping s#ite from China and how to set up a coffee stall.
The OP in this thread has no idea, no experience and no clue about what is involved. If it makes you and others feel good to encourage them, off you go. But it diminishes you as a Mod in the sight of many, and is another nail in the coffin of a forum that is supposed to be about sound advice for Business and Entrepreneurship. It’s only a matter of time before all with anything sensible to respond will be gone.
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The posters you mentioned were indeed excellent contributors here but they did so in a style that was encouraging as opposed to disparaging. No is going to ask for advice if they believe they are going to be made feel stupid. You wouldn’t like it, why would anyone else?
If you want to contribute to E&BM you are most welcome. You obviously have loads of knowledge and experience relevant to the business community but please share it in a manner that is constructive.
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Calm down there Peter Jones, this isn't dragons den, the op isn't looking for investment. They are in the testing the market phase, not investment ready phase. No need to make up your own scenario and pluck figures out of the air that suits your own conclusions
I also googled "Crumbs Bake Shop" - this was a publicly traded company that went bust, OP is asking how to setup a home business not float on the stock exchange. No relevance to the OP questions or their scenario
@OP, you will need to do a course to understand allergens, maintaining cold chain etc etc. In terms of operations, you are right to just get the bare minimum in place to test your products out and go from there, a concept called "minimum viable product". If you are going to fail then fail fast. If it goes well, you can always upgrade later on when you are confident you'll get a return on investment.
Depending on the nature of the product, you could look at getting a food truck/trailer that is already HSE certified to do your cooking in. That will be a few k of investment but will hold its value well and give you that separation/division between home and work and a hse certified workspace.
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We don't know what the op is going to make but going with the home baking scenario discussed above the bulk of people doing that are just trying to earn a bit as a top up to family income, they are not trying to get stocked in Lidl/Aldi/Tesco etc!
It's no coincidence that the bulk of them are women as it allows the flexibility of working around home life/school drop off/child minding, you can work from home at times that suit you, no travel expenses/parking/tolls/work lunches/work clothes/random coffee expenses etc etc. Yes there are some costs still like shopping for supplies but a lot is delivered to the door these days and sure you'll be in the supermarkets anyway.
It would seldom exceed or replace a good PAYE job but that's not usually what is being looked for, it's more likely whoever is doing it is not in a position to go that route for whatever reason!
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That post shows the level of response here and a failure to even read the OP. It’s a low cost start-up, so a food van (jeez, yet another one!) is not a runner. I did not ‘pluck figures to suit my scenario’ – thay are back-of-envelope valid valid and more than anybody else provided. The OP is not, as poster says at the ‘testing the market stage’, she is sitting on a couch dreaming and has provided no hard info.. In mentioning Crumbs Bake shop, it was referencing food fads, as an example of how they go out of fashion – think of smoothies, squeezy oranges, donut kiosks, Instant Delight, slow cookers, etc. When I got to the bit of lecturing on ‘minimum viable product’ and ‘if you’re going to fail, fail fast’ I gave up, in case I’d next meet MVP’s twin, ‘co-evolving dynamic ecosystems’ and emphasis on nimbleness. It’s a kitchen sink business FFS.
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Much of the ‘advice’ given in this forum (and thread in particular) consists of platitudes and clichés and as such is not worthwhile. The acid test for any person contemplating a start-up is “How would an investor view this?” It is even recommended to ask a family member for views. Anybody who says differently is inexperienced and probably is a junior clerk with too much time.
At this stage it doesn’t matter if the OP is making cakes, jam, soup, or fish pies, it’s food, the product H&S/FSAI questions come later.. “Shur, it’ll be grand’ is the first toll of the death knell for a new business. The second is “Just go for it!” and the third is “Don’t listen to the naysayers!”.
Questions to OP
1. Do you own the home you intend to operate from? If ‘yes’ go to Q2; if ‘No’, have you got the landlord’s permission? No? you are liable to be evicted by the landlord because you will be in breach of a standard clause in the lease and also in breach of any mortgage the landlord has on the property.
2. So you own the home/premises. Have you told your mortgage holder that you intend to use part of it as a commercial kitchen? Have they agreed? If not, the loan can be called in for breach of the loan agreement.
3. Have you informed your insurer? If not, and there is a fire, you will not be covered. Domestic appliances such as breadmakers frequently go on fire. You are pushing the safety envelope by using domestic equipment for commercial use.
4. How do you intend to distribute your product? If you have people calling to buy or take product for delivery, you need planning permission. One phonecall from an annoyed neighbour is all it takes to shut you down.
5. If you are using your car, you need commercial insurance.
The list goes on, but if you want real advice provide some proper detail. It was asked for earlier, but ignored. See #8 above………..(If you want to be taken seriously show some figures, input costs, projected turnover, percentage for wastage, depreciation , etc….)
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I'm the OP.
I'm simply looking for done advise from someone who has done this and possibly moved to a premises, or built a pro kitchen.
I don't have food experience but I've plenty of business experience. I scaled a start up, from self funding with 20k to over 1mill turnover in 6 years. I had a team of staff and worked huge hours. I've won the business awards, worded with Leo and enterprise Ireland. I appreciate you're being honest, but I just want honest advise about if it's doable at home to start.
I'm still trading, doing a good turnover but my heart & interest isn't in it, so I've scaled it back. I've changed my lifestyle and have a family so want something more friendly to that.
The costings, projections etc. Are all great to do. I've done these with a different hat on and at times it's just guessing figures based on who I'm trying to please. Bank, EI, investors etc
Good is different, extremely different. That is why I'm asking for good advise.
I own my home.
I have space with exterior door that I can use as a kitchen if needed.
I have insurance for trading from here since covid, but again food is different.
Thank you for all of your posts on this.
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This thread seriously lacks credibility. Two weeks after a few questions the OP reverts without answering the key ones. She is either a Boardsie staffer trying to drive traffic or a dreamer. If OP was that serious, she would have posted some figures, projections, or even detailed the product proposition. First item in a search of OP’s previous posts talks about hair extensions and not being able to afford €800 for maintaining them. I know zilch about hair extensions but I do know that someone who cannot now afford €800 for something has never – as claimed above - run a business that has maintained a near €1 million t/o for years.
“I scaled a start up, from self funding with 20k to over 1mill turnover in 6 years. I had a team of staff and worked huge hours. I've won the business awards, worded with Leo and enterprise Ireland.”
Well, if that is true, and as she claims “I know about business” she would know that she needs to put a little bit of money where her mouth is and that she needs time in a rented commercial kitchen; she also would have investigated incubator units, what firms like Musgraves do for food start-ups, etc.
To finish writing a post with a cliche and TY school project stuff -
‘The costings, projections etc. Are all great to do. I've done these with a different hat on and at times it's just guessing figures based on who I'm trying to please. Bank, EI, investors etc
Good is different, extremely different. That is why I'm asking for good advise.
Anyone who writes that a business plan is ‘just guessing figures based on who I'm trying to please’ well, that sums up the OP’s lack of experience and credibility.
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What are you hoping to achieve by posting here Mick Tator?
As I continually told you when you called yourself Pedro something or other, treat people how you would like to be treated.
You have so much to offer this place yet you choose, in your usual caustic style, to berate, belittle and be a pain in the behind. Try building something instead of knocking it down.
The Gloomster!
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