How to start a bakery

To start a bakery business, like with any business, you must come up with a business plan. This plan should include:

• What you will need to begin (i.e. building, equipment, supplies, etc.)

• How much you are willing to spend to begin

• What your monthly bills will amount to

• What products you plan to sell with documented recipes

• What your corporate name will be and what you will trade as (many companies have a corporate name and also a store name, to allow for limited liability and easy growth)

• Organizing profit and loss documentation/tax information

The universal tips that any bakery business owner will give you are simple. Most would tell you to buy supplies closest to what you would use. For instance: a 25 tray oven would be very pointless if your daily quantities do not exceed 10 trays. In this circumstance, an oven that supports no more than 15 or 20 trays is fine, because it takes up less space than the 25 tray oven, but gives you room to expand.

Everyone will give you advice about equipment and types of products, but there is one thing that is more important. To run a successful bakery you must have customers.

Customers of a bakery come in two forms: the take-away customer and the contract or bulk customer. To succeed, you need both types. The takeaway customers will provide you with daily cash and quick sales, usually under $10 per transaction. The bulk sales/contracts and daily deliveries will pay the bills, but only every 15 or 30 days.

The bulk customer is very important for financial reasons. If you can figure a normal expectation of what your contracts will amount to, you can work backwards, figuring how much to allot for rent, equipment purchases, lease, advertising, utilities, and salaries.

Staff

Makes sure you have the number of people that are appropriate to the needs of the business. A very busy bakery will require several members of staff to deal with a rush of customers and to make sure there is an appropriate turnover of the products that are sold. A less busy bakery on the hand (possibly one that serves only local residents) can on the other hand survive with 2 or 3 members of staff. They are often family oriented types businesses.

Location

One of the most important decisions that will need to be given consideration to when drawing up your business plan is the location. The location is of up most importance when it comes to having a successful bakery business. A bakery needs to be located in a busy area with other business and public transport close-by.

Competition

You will have to remember that competition in this field is quite fierce as there are some well-known bakeries that operate at the national level that seem to have stores everywhere. It is very important therefore not to go head-to-head with them. Rather, you should focus on making the business different in some way. Perhaps its best to remain a bakery with strong local affiliations.