Small Food Businesses Afraid to Scale
These businesses, ranging from bakeries and online kitchens to convenience stores and microbreweries, are struggling to grow beyond a certain revenue level or are hesitant to launch due to fear of failure and financial risk. Many are facing challenges with consistency, scaling, and the anxiety of investing resources without guaranteed success. The common thread is the vulnerability and uncertainty inherent in small, often home-based, food and beverage ventures.
SOURCES (60)
“My restaurant has been getting our liquor liability + commercial insurance through a local broker, and this year despite having to cut our hours and sales in half due to some health issues and the local economy tanking, our insurance is higher - we've been…”
“I ran a restaurant for 3 years and have 17 years total experiance in the industry.”
“I’d start with weekly mahjong nights inside an existing café before signing a dedicated lease.”
“I private bartended a wedding for a restaurant owner’s daughter last year. They had me create a small custom cocktail menu, which was a hit. Now the owner wants me to revamp the cocktail menu at his small mom-and-pop restaurant. They currently have about 7 cocktails, and he only wants 1–2 new drinks. The bigger goal is to increase sales by improving the presentation of the existing cocktails (nicer glassware, more appealing garnishes, better presentation, etc.) The menu itself is already pretty”
“I am currently in the process of opening a small counter service Hot Dog restaurant in an affluent and touristy beach town. We aim to bring a classic and affordable food option for those who don’t want to break the bank as many of the other restaurants in the area are overpriced. We know that a lot of the kids in the area love to hang out in the area and there’s only two places they can really afford which is Pizza or Smoothies. We also have a lot of tourists and late night crowds because of the”
“I’ve got my food handlers card, my county license, I hand drew my own logo (actually really proud of how it turned out), started an instagram account, etc Things have been going really well! My monthly net income is only about $100, though this month is already surpassing that, which is why I’m here. At what point do I need to start filling taxes? How do I file taxes as a small business? Surely it’s not the same as filing as an employee? Do I need an LLC? Should I invest in the food management l”
“Do you know how well they’re actually doing or you’re just seeing lines? As in you know their figures or just imagining profit? Have you looked into the requirements of what it would take to open a truck and commissaries in your area? Also restaurants tend to be reluctant to let OTHER food businesses take away their customers. I’d advise doing a lot more research beyond monkey see monkey do.”
“There’s no foot traffic but in my area there are a couple of food trucks parked in parking lots and are doing well. I was thinking of doing something like that or asking a restaurant to sell alongside them.”
“Have you made a plan anywhere beyond just designing a brand? Most people who have never owned a business think the business logo and business name are the hardest part about starting a business. Those kind of people rarely make it to the point of actually starting the business.”
“Getting a LLC and designing a brand seems simple enough I think. I want to sell boba milk tea and Korean corn dogs. I was thinking on renting a commercial kitchen but none are listed anywhere around me. Should I ask restaurants if I can rent their kitchen or should I buy a food truck? I’ve heard that it’s best to setup shop in a place with a lot of foot traffic. Is this true? There are no places like that near me. Any help is greatly appreciated. submitted by /u/gioscat [link]”
“I know a lot of people don’t like to hear it, but I keep very good books. I use XERO for my accounting and square for my sales and I’m pretty OCD about keeping good records, but I don’t have the accounting backgrounds to have done those projections myself in any meaningful window of time. So, I used ChatGPT. I fed it PNL reports square reports, all redacted, of course, loan assumptions, market information, etc., etc. and it did more math than I could’ve done in a week in a couple minutes, and th”
“I’m planning on starting a mobile bartending business and I want to know if it would be possible for me to quit my job and do this full time ? I would like to make an average of 8-9000 month profit and have a small team. I understand it would take time to gather cliente and my brand submitted by /u/Worth_Clue3450 [link] [comments]”
“There’s a market but it’s brutal. CNA help, assume $20hr x 24 hrs a day = 14,400/month Healthcare supplies, food, utilities, cleaning, liability insurance etc. Assume that’s another 5k per month. So basically 20k to run the business. You need 5 residents at 4K each/month just to break even. I’m not saying it’s impossible because there’s people that do it but it’s definitely hard.”
“Hi All- I've got a confectionary company in a HCOL city. This is a bad combo because, most of our business is wholesale-through a distributor- and margins are consequently quite low. To top that off, we are in a bad part of town- loads of drugs and homelessness. A sad situation, and understandably, many people do not want to attend our quaint retail location. I'm finding my time to be super stretched. Yes, I am working on adding automation to help make volume easier, but that takes time”
“Just curious. If you’re comfortable sharing your general region, your rent, and what it gets you, this could be helpful. I’m in the Ozarks, and sublet access to a larger commissary kitchen that has a prime tenant for $500/month. My own workspace is very limited, but have access to all the amenities and 24 hour access. We have large walk in freezer and cooler space, dish, hood, etc… and about 2000 sqft of space if I had to guess. Truck parking as well, but not available to us (landlord keeps his”
“I'm also unsure whether OPs emotional attachment and goodwill to his family name will result in them losing the prime years of their lives to a dud. I think there's an opportunity to OP to learn the ropes but then as you say everything needs to change or they need to move away and start afresh.”
“You are talking Sales, or revenue. I am talking earnings, or income. Big difference.”
“I have a small owner operator burrito shop. How do I break the cycle of growing, getting overwhelmed, and shrinking again? How do I break the cycle of growing, getting overwhelmed, and shrinking again with my owner operator burrito shop? Been in business since 2018 I own a small independent burrito shop, and I’ve noticed that I keep repeating the same cycle. Sales start slowing down, so I cut staff and go back to working heavily in the business myself. I pay attention to every little detail like”
“I run a small custom furniture shop and for the longest time I just baked local delivery into the price. Figured people liked seeing one number and I didn't want to nickel and dime anyone. A few months ago I changed it so the furniture and delivery are separate. Customers can pick it up for free or pay depending on distance. I expected complaints but its been the complete opposite. People seem happier having the choice, way more customers are picking up themselves than I expected, and I actu”
“Only way to try to fix is to repair broken trust where possible. The scheme is what broke trust, and customers were burned. Any attempts to make them whole would help to rebuild trust. That said - no guarantees there and this is also why you need to be very careful involving family, customers and friends in any form of ‘investment’ that you don’t have strong knowledge or control over.”
“Hello everyone, I’m M 22 and I’m proud to say that me and a friend have mine have started the process of opening power very own takeout/ restaurant. This has been a passion of ours for a long time and we just got lucky with our situation that allowed us to pursue it. We are planning on opening a BBQ smokehouse. We’ve done our research and found that at least around our area there isn’t a bbq spot. We are still brainstorming the layout of the place and what equipments we might need. We are workin”
“There is a new bubble tea business that is struggling and for sale. Less than 2 years, $20k monthly revenue with $6k rent including all. It has a tiny hood over a stove. Based on November. If only one employee. How much money kid’s per month? Question: Is it possible to buy it and switch bob’s and make money? I can try to sell some simple food. Or talk to landlord till it goes out of business? Thanks submitted by /u/paperatic [link] [comments]”
“How much do you lose before breaking even or making a profit? submitted by /u/Nice_Relationship888 [link] [comments]”
“The other day we had a delivery order and this was our view from the entrance. I didn’t get a picture of the back but there were more cases and kegs directly behind it. submitted by /u/markeesimo [link] [comments]”
“I run a small catering company in Chicago and we specialize in seafood boils and New England style events, and we are looking to add live lobster to our menu for the upcoming summer season. We have been using a local distributor but their prices have gone up and the quality has been inconsistent, sometimes the lobsters arrive weak or dead and we end up having to scramble for replacements. We are looking for a direct supplier from Maine that can ship live lobsters in bulk on a regular basis, mayb”
“Interesting concept. I’d probably start with one question: what’s the average value of a new customer to the restaurant? Once you know that, it becomes much easier to work backwards and decide whether a flat fee, pay-per-customer, or paid access to specific slow periods makes the most sense.”
“It doesn’t answer it without OP also explaining how they bring outsiders into the equation, because otherwise it will just be a service for existing customers to pay even less to the struggling restaurant.”
“I currently have 3, if you’re still looking to start I can give you some guidance”
“Renting the wrong space. I rented the first space I toured instead of taking time to figure out needs vs wants, budget, and researching the area. I ended up overpaying for a unit that I couldn't really use for anything but storage when I could've operated out of a friend's barn until I found the right space.”
“Do you know how expensive it is to open a restaurant? Part of the sale cost of the restaurant includes: Permitting hurdles Zoning hurdles Finding a space and remodeling it Buying water credits Paying your lease during construction The cost of new equipment I see that expensive price and my first question is how many restaurant spaces are for lease in the area and compare in locatiomnand traffic. This could be a unicorn spot with impossible entry into the area with low sales. And when I say for l”
“I wish I would have done market research and written a proper business plan to see if my food truck would be a sustainable business. It would have given me a business plan to follow instead of just guessing. Basically, I wish I learned how to be a business owner before I invested money into a food truck because cooking food is like 10% of thr equation and being an educated business owner is 90% of owning a sustainable food truck.”
“Flat fees typically fails in Indian context before the model is proven. From the restaurants perspective, they will ask "Why should I pay before I get any business, rather, why should I paye you even if I get zero benifits"”
“This year has been bad to the point that the pole barn we had built on our little piece of land that is supposed to be the detail shop has been put on pause until business picks back up. And considering I live in the Midwest there's really only about 6-10 more weeks of viable weather for detailing This has been my worst year since I started in 2023. I am very very grateful that I decided to stay at my full time job because I was overwhelmed and considered leaving around this time last year I”
“How is this fundamentally different than restaurants already offering things like lunch deals and happy hour pricing? Why do they need you as a middleman?”
“You mentioned 2X with as much as +0.75. I quoted “maybe $250k” at 2X +0.50. Do we disagree?”
“I wouldn’t try to decide “restaurant or no restaurant” yet. Your own comment that you haven’t really researched it is probably the useful part here. Before signing a lease or building anything, I’d ask: what is the cheapest experiment that could prove me wrong? For example, test a very limited menu through pop-ups, events, pre-orders or an existing kitchen before committing to a permanent location. Then measure a few boring numbers: average ticket food cost per order labor/time per order orders”
“Choose whaever thst gives you more flexibility to adapt, grow and stay relevant to the preference of your targeted consumers. For me that would be the tent”
“Where is the best place to find businesses to buy. Is that like biz buy sell or is there another place, or do you reach out? submitted by /u/AlreadyHereNow [link] [comments]”
“Ask a friend to come take orders for you and pay them in beer and pizza. It will help to have someone take orders for you. It will make your life so much easier. Bring marketing materials for future caterings! You never know who you will meet that might want to hire you! Even if it’s just a business cards. When you’re slow. ,clean and look presentable. Talk with guest who order from you and grab feedback and mention you cater. Bring some extra water for yourself Just have fun and don’t sweat the”
“So, I got to fully set up this kitchen (reply in comments) and I want to know people’s thoughts on running this for approx 40 people a day solo. I personally think having a line cook with me would help a lot while I handle the cooking plus prep plus head chef stuff like orders and menu creation and portions. This is for a private company and not for public consumption. Fully a private catering basically. I feel a bit overwhelmed as this is my first kitchen to helm fully by myself but I think it’”
“If you are primarily talking drinks, donuts, etc. The profit margin can be good, COG in the 20-30% range. But for that to be profitable it's all about volume. If you sell 200 drinks at $7/drink your gross is $1400. Your COGS will be around $200, entry fee $20-100, fixed cost of permits, insurance, website, fuel, etc. around $300. If you hire staff at least another $100/person. Per event you are looking at around $500-800 above costs. If you are in a large metro area you will be competing aga”
“There are easier ways to make money. Also, I found that it was taking away my passion for cooking. It was boring cooking the same thing over and over. Customers wanted the same recipe... they didn't like me trying different things.”
“I’m going back to the restaurant field after my family retired and sold all their restaurants. It’s been 8 years now and I’m ready to start in 3 years. I’m planning everything out right now so I’m trying to learn and get as much advice as possible! This is a question for people who’ve operated upper scale restaurants. Any advice is appreciated. submitted by /u/Cultural-Beginning61 [link] [comments]”
“You have to be a really good business owner to operate any sustainable food truck. If you haven't written a business plan or done any market research then you won't evn be a medicore sustainable business owner.”
“reposting something i wrote CATERING PRICING COMPONENTS okay, so let me explain how we price a catering. there are three components: fundamental pricing headcount calculation application of minimum FUNDAMENTAL PRICING at the heart of every catering is a meal and there is a price for every meal. we are a burger truck so every catering meal is a burger, fries and drink. that meal is $18. on top of this we charge a 15% setup fee. this is NOT A GRATUITY. if it were then my workers would legally get”
“Number of guests × average purchase price x 1.2 (20% upcharge) or... give out tickets that are worth $10-$25 each (depending on your food price) and charge them for the number of tickets they want. Anything beyond that the people will need to pay out of pocket for.”
“If yours going into business with family. Have a very clear operating agreement that dictates each persons roles and duties. Currently trying to separate from my family restaurant and it’s a f***ing mess. It’s possible but it’s hard. Also understand your food cost and always have a back up plan.- for example if your generator goes out ? What then? Do you have a second gennerator to cover while you get main up and running or can you tie into the event power and your generator is the back up plan”