Self employed venture....

firstly you'll need to register with the local council to have your kitchen inspected and rated, this needs to be done at least 28 days prior to beginning trading, you may need a second sink put in (dependent on council) and have things like fire blankets, extinguishers etc

you'll need a food hygiene / safety certification, get on to reed.co.uk and get an online one for £20 from the training terminal, wont take long to complete online, take me 30 minutes to whiz through when I update mine, mainly common sense stuff.

you'll need to get this https://www.food.gov.uk/business-industry/sfbb (free downloadable) it's a decent all in way to show health inspectors etc that you're complying with the law.

you'll need to have public and product liability insurance of 5 million if you want to work most markets, car boots and other events, this is about £60 a year, or you can join something like the NMTF - national market traders federation, costs £120 a year and gives you all the required insurances and employer insurance, along with policies that will pay for assistance if you're investigated by HMRC etc etc

costing / charging etc etc is easy in catering, stick to the rule of 1/3rds, 1/3 in costs for the product, 1/3 for overheads, 1/3 for profit, standard things int he catering industry.

work out your cost for a batch of your cookies or whatever, work out the cost for whatever size unit you're selling, then treble the price and that's your figure you want to be aiming for, of course some things can be sold for more, some for less, things can be sold for more in different places etc etc but aiming for 1/3 for ingredients and 2/3 for other costs and profits is a decent starting point

take a look here - for margins do 66 to 70%
https://www.brake.co.uk/your-business/tools/gross-profit-calculator

if you wish to sell from your actual home you'll likely need permission from the council / housing association / mortgage company etc to run a business from your property.

take a look at startuploans.co.uk for helpful guides and other things and for funding and mentoring for small start ups.

Hi Lottie

I have quite a few friends doing this.

Go with what you have a passion for and what your friends and family will buy and help spread the word initially. There's load of competition with baking, but still load of niches still not fully monetised online, zero waste, vegan, high protein, artisan and allergen foods to name a few. You will need a niche to do anything online.

You should also look at what you can leverage locally or through contacts, loan of specialist kit, capital to buy etc, do you live near a mill or anything like that, to give you an advantage or differentiating factor over similar companies.

Costs are down to how you intend to compete - generally only three ways to compete - on cost (not a good idea), quality or innovation. The last two yield higher margins and lower turnover = less cooking :-)

Regarding the basic hygiene, virtual college do the C&G approved one online, but as suggested ask your local council what accreditation bodies they accept before signing up.

Good luck :-)

Lottie_1987 wrote: »

Thank you so much for all the information
Just wondering if I want to put the feelers put for who would be interested do I have to set up first? Or would I just have to make some and give them to people without exchanging money to see of its popular?

Be careful when you get to this point - friends and family will sit like nodding dogs and smile telling you they're fantastic but the real proof of the pudding (pun intended) is whether or not they'd actually pay the asking price for them.

tastyhog wrote: »

if you wish to sell from your actual home you'll likely need permission from the council / housing association / mortgage company etc to run a business from your property.

I think that even if you don't intend to sell from home you probably should have the permission of your mortgage lender or landlord to run a business from home. Permission should not be unreasonably refused, but if the business will result in more callers to the home than before then that might cause 'nuisance', perhaps especially if your road has parking problems.

Insurance: you should also tell your household insurer, especially if you're going to have business visitors to the house. I'm guessing you won't need to keep huge amounts of stock / supplies at home, so be ready to outline exactly how little additional impact the business will have on your insurance needs.

Think of contingency plans: what if you / the baby / your partner are taken ill and you can't complete a job? For that reason, give yourself plenty of time to complete things and refuse last minute rush jobs ... Build up an emergency fund: if your Kenwood dies, you probably want to be able to replace it pdq. And so on.