How to start up, lots of help needed!

1stBusiness

fishybusiness wrote: »

Following your thoughts about buying wholesale....

Have you priced up the cost of sweets, and how much you can purchase say 20kg of midget gems for, and then looked at the retail price?

Also, looking at turnover with a wholesaler, minimum orders quantity may be an issue to get any kind of discount worth having.

What I am getting at is that at this stage the numbers really are important to start to get a grip of what is possible. Some of the questions you are asking would be answered if you had a chat with a wholesaler.



Is anyone else doing it at your market? If not, there is your opening. We bought sweety gift hampers before Christmas, and if you could make them rather than buy in, wouldn't that drop your costs, and increase margins, plus make the product your own rather than just bought it?

As far as I know, apart from the sweet shop I mentioned before, there is nobody selling sweets as gifts on the market.

I plan on buying the sweets/gift wrapping etc in bulk and making my own hampers, wedding favours, party bags etc myself. That way customers will be able to chose which sweets they would like (cost would depend on which sweets they chose).

I haven't priced anything up yet, so I'm not sure of any costs. From experience, it's been quite expensive to make the odd gift (I've made presents for friends and family), so bulk wold probably be my best bet to keep costs to a minimum. The problem is I've often looked online at buying sweet hampers etc and I found them to be a rip off! That's why I decided to make my own. I don't want to be charging customers ridiculous amounts either.

Mistral001

1stBusiness wrote: »

The problem is I've often looked online at buying sweet hampers etc and I found them to be a rip off! That's why I decided to make my own. I don't want to be charging customers ridiculous amounts either.

That is probably one of the best reasons for choosing a particular niche. There is something you want and find that nobody supplies exactly what you want. However, one big piece of advice that is given on the forum over and over is to charge enough. Do not try to compete on price but compete on service, quality, and uniqueness.

fishybusiness

I don't want to be charging customers ridiculous amounts either.

If the market demands a good price, you can charge it.

trailingspouse

I used to run a business making cupcakes. We were living in Ireland, so things may have been slightly different, but here goes -

I was renting at the time, this wasn't an issue either for Environmental Health or our landlord. Environmental Health paid me a visit - and only gave me 45 minutes notice. Quite a good ploy on their part, as a kitchen is either clean or it isn't, and you can't do much in 45 minutes if the kitchen is filthy!!

I didn't need a bank loan - I used bowls, mixer, cupcake trays etc that I already owned, so the only 'risk' was the cost of ingredients. After a while I bought a bigger mixing bowl (cost, oo, €9.99!!!) so that I could make 3 dozen at a time, and an extra bun tray, but that's all.

I took my wares to local farmer's markets, had a regular order from a local business for their Friday afternoon meeting, and spent an afternoon going round every tea room in the town to see if they looked like they might want to buy my cupcakes. I then went back to the likely ones a couple of days later with a couple of free cupcakes (nicely packaged) and a price list, contact details etc - got a regular order from one cafe for that. Also did wedding cupcakes for a couple of people I knew, and developed a gluten and lactose-free version for a woman whose son was allergic to pretty much everything.

I did a food hygiene course, took out PL insurance, did my costings carefully (your selling price has to cover not just the cost of the ingredients, but also the cupcake cases, the cake boxes, the extra gas or electric, the cost of insurance, the cost of hiring a stand at the market, petrol for making deliveries, etc etc). We produced our own brochures - OH is a photographer, so I made a sample batch, he photographed them, and together we designed a brochure which we then printed onto proper A5 brochure paper.

I could make and ice 5 dozen cupcakes in 2 hours. Never got bored with making them. But bizarrely, I don't have a sweet tooth and the only time I would eat them would be if I was trying out a new idea!

My advice is - do the research, and if you decide it's right for you (and I'm afraid 'I like sweets' isn't a good enough reason) then go for it.

pelirocco

1stBusiness wrote: »

As far as I know, apart from the sweet shop I mentioned before, there is nobody selling sweets as gifts on the market.

I plan on buying the sweets/gift wrapping etc in bulk and making my own hampers, wedding favours, party bags etc myself. That way customers will be able to chose which sweets they would like (cost would depend on which sweets they chose).

I haven't priced anything up yet, so I'm not sure of any costs. From experience, it's been quite expensive to make the odd gift (I've made presents for friends and family), so bulk wold probably be my best bet to keep costs to a minimum. The problem is I've often looked online at buying sweet hampers etc and I found them to be a rip off! That's why I decided to make my own. I don't want to be charging customers ridiculous amounts either.

You might think the prices being charged are a rip off , but you have no idea what the overheads are

Apart from factoring in the costs of buying the product you also need to factor in a wastage % ( if you are buying in bulk you have to be sure you can sell before the product spoils ) You will also need to factor in a wage for yourself , there is no point working for nothing .
You seem to be keen to have your own business , no matter what it is , its not too difficult setting up a business or even running one .........the tricky bit is running a successful business !!

You really dont want to get into the realms of borrowing money at this stage . I would try it for a month and see what response you get .

As a business owner for the last 20 odd years I know only too well how much work you have to put in

1stBusiness

My advice is - do the research, and if you decide it's right for you (and I'm afraid 'I like sweets' isn't a good enough reason) then go for it.

Thanks for all your help

I realise I didn't give much background information when I said that I like sweets I'm very creative and will often see something that I think is easy enough to make myself rather than buy. In the past I've made sweet hampers/mugs with a selection of sweets in and gift wrapped etc, but that's been for friends/family/work colleagues. I usually source my sweets from the supermarket and discount shops like Poundland, but that's only when I've been making the odd few gifts.

You might think the prices being charged are a rip off , but you have no idea what the overheads are

Apart from factoring in the costs of buying the product you also need to factor in a wastage % ( if you are buying in bulk you have to be sure you can sell before the product spoils ) You will also need to factor in a wage for yourself , there is no point working for nothing .
You seem to be keen to have your own business , no matter what it is , its not too difficult setting up a business or even running one .........the tricky bit is running a successful business !!

You really dont want to get into the realms of borrowing money at this stage . I would try it for a month and see what response you get .

As a business owner for the last 20 odd years I know only too well how much work you have to put in

True, I don't know what their overheads are. I worked at a school Christmas fayre once and there was a lady selling vanilla cupcakes for £1.75 a go! I was horrified :eek: however, since making cupcakes a few times for friends I realise just how expensive they are.

I'm planning on trying this part-time first, to see if the business will be viable enough to run full-time.

lincroft1710

trailingspouse wrote: »

I used to run a business making cupcakes.

May I ask why you closed the business?

trailingspouse

Yes, you may!!

We were living in Ireland, and then we moved back to the UK. In Ireland we were in a relatively quiet part of the West Coast, and I knew I was the only person locally making cupcakes - coming back to the UK I knew I was unlikely to be able to compete with people who already had established businesses. Also, to be honest, I felt that the cupcake market was somewhat saturated.

Life moves on - OH and I now run a business providing validation services to the pharmaceutical industry. It's a funny old world...

27col

As someone has already said. The fact that you like sweets and cakes is not a good reason to start a business selling them.
I think that I am right in saying that any business start up loan will involve you taking a part of the risk by putting in some of your own money.
Best of luck with it, anyway.

problemcashback

Can I just give you a bit of a reality of running your own business it can be one of the greatest things you can ever do, it always looks from the outside that it is but the reality can be so much different. Very long hours and I mean long hours, I used to work in a family retail business and at Christmas we could work 16 to 20 hours a day, 7 days a week, most weeks were 6 day weeks and 12 hour days. Holidays were non existent, pay just enough to get by, and I mean get by.

Retail whether it's coffee shops or shops require rent, not cheap, rent reviews and leases you cannot get out of easily, business rates and utilities. Rents forced our closure after 40 years and I went to Uni as a mature ish student (best thing I ever did) in the summer I bought a load of goods at auction and sold them at a local market, didn't have a regular pitch so needed to be there at 5 to see if I could get one some days I did others I didnt, sold most things and made a little profit.

My advice is don't rush, make sure you have capital, good business plan, expect to work hard but don't expect to make millions out of it you may not even make enough to pay the bills some weeks . Good luck.