How Do You Start a Business????

Hi there.
You do need to be online. It's where everyone goes these days. I have several friends that have gone into business for themselves. 2 of them are bakers and one sells homemade pocketbooks. I can certainly pick their brains for you. I went with a franchise so I just follow the proven business system I didn't have to create anything myself. :)
I can help you with a web site if you decide you want to be online. Let me know if you have specific questions. I'm willing to bet they would even chat with you to help you out. :)

My mom is a professional chef, and has become a chef instructor at a culinary school. She caters private events from time to time. What I can recommend to you is that you need to call the health department where you live, and find out what the requirements are to become a caterer. It's likely they will tell you that you need to make your food in a commercial kitchen (there ARE commercial kitchens available for rent, however, in most metropolitan areas, and the price is not usually that high). You will need to take the ServSafe course (or the equivalent in your state).

Once you have that settled, it's advisable for you to form a corporation (protects you from personal liability). Legalzoom.com can do this for you, and it's not terribly expensive. Your accountant can advise you as to whether you should form an LLC or an S-corp.

From there, call your insurance broker and get liability insurance. Again, not terribly expensive, but worth it.

You can have a business without incorporating or having insurance, but I wouldn't advise it. My mom has incorporated her catering business. With all the food allergies out there, it's not worth having someone sue you and losing everything personally because of it.

Anyway, when we incorporated our business (in California), it took about 8 weeks to do all of that between the IRS and the State, and about 5 minutes to get insurance. :) We keep our books on Quickbooks, but you could just as well use Quicken, iBank, etc. What I like about Quickbooks is that it reminds me when quarterly taxes are due (but I have payroll, so that's what my taxes are related to - ask your accountant for more info on taxes). Generally, if you are an S-corp, your profits/losses pass through to your personal income, although you do have to file taxes on behalf of the actual corporation along with your personal taxes - so there are some extra accounting fees around tax time.

You can advertise anywhere you like - FB, CL, the PennySaver, TV, the newspaper...

ETA: as to your question in the SWH - yep, I am half-owner of a commercial construction company. I know that is a far cry from the culinary field, but my business is successful. :)

Before everything - you need a business plan.

It doesn't have to be written like someone with an MBA, but you do need the basics of estimated costs and income. Break those two categories down further into rent, equip, labor, insurance...etc.

http://www.score.org/

See if you can find a small business mentor in your area.

You will need a business plan.
Include name of business you will need Togo and get a DBA to make sure no one else owns the name and no one else can take your.

You will need to take a food safety course and be certified. You will need to find a commercial kitchen that will allow you to rent time .

You will need to have a a budget for rent, supplies, deliveries.

Then you wil be able to advertise or join a farmers market, sell to local stores or take orders from different clients or restaurants.

I agree to call the health dept and find out the regulations for your area on food prep and selling to the public.

Good luck!

Before you do anything you need to look at the regulations. Food carries a mess of safety issues. You need to know what is required just to start up the business they form a business plan.

There is a huge difference between making a cake and getting money under the counter than when you make it a business.

I hate to rain on your parade but this is not going to be as easy as you think. Without looking at the numbers I would estimate the start up costs will force you to be viable immediately or you will go under quick. Food is a very hard businesses to start up even if you know what you are doing.

First thing you should do is to look into your state regulations. Here in PA you have to have a commercial bakery set up-you are not permitted to just cook in your own kitchen. Well, you can do it but your kitchen has to meet a ton of requirements. I know this because a friend of mine wanted to do this but didn't prceed once she found out about all of the red tape.
There are tons of success stories around this kind of hting-I would spend some time researching them and then contacting some of them for advice.

I did a quick search online, and from what I can tell, Nevada does not have a cottage food law. This means, as others have said, you have to take a food safety course, find a commercial kitchen to rent, and get the blessing of the health department.

Unless you do the above, it would be illegal to advertise since you would not be a "legal" business. And yes, there have been home bakers who have been "busted" for running a baked goods business out of their home in states where that is not allowed (usually called in by "professional" bakers that have gone through the appropriate steps).

So, I'd say start with your research. Find out if it's even possible to run a home bakery (since my search was only about 2 minutes long...).

first off, i hate to say it, but if you are going to sell your products you are going to need a commercial kitchen and licenses thereof.
i hate how hard it is to do a small start-up business these days, and food is one of the more highly regulated ones.
i'm not saying this to be discouraging. it sounds like a wonderful and viable business. but do your homework first. go to your chamber of commerce and get the lowdown before you put your family at risk by selling products without all the blessings conferred by Big Brother.
edited to add, yes, i had my own successful small abstracting business for 20 years. i was my only employee (mostly because of the stupid red tape and strangling bureaucracy around hiring people) so other than some additional hoops to jump through and taxes to pay at tax time it wasn't an issue. i didn't have to get the same certification and licenses that a food business would have entailed. but i loved it. you can't beat being your own boss. it allowed me the flexibility to homeschool my kids and keep working, and brought in essential income. the internet put me out of business! :)
khairete
S.

If you want to start a business involving any kind of cooking and baking for the public I suggest you speak to your local health department. There are many laws connected to the restuarant or catering industry.

Yes we started our own business. It's in raw materials distribution/ consulting.

You don't just jump in, start a business and make $$.

You need a detailed business plan, good tax and legal counsel to make sure all your t' s are crossed just right and all the I's properly dotted! It's a lot of work, takes a lot of start up $$. We refused to take loans, etc from the bank because if you do.... The bank owns your business and they call shots... Why not? They are the ones who provided the cash

There are quarterly reports, taxes, payroll taxes, etc to be done and done properly. Don't mess with the IRS.

I use Quickbooks Pro to manage my AP/receivables, payroll, quarterly reports, etc.

As a start up, your suppliers are unlikely to give you credit until you prove yourself. We did a lot of cash in advance in the beginning and it was tough paying out $40,000-$60,000 BEFORE our customers paid us in 30 days. We offer a discount if someone pays in 10 days. We now have suppliers begging us to use them because they know they will be paid before an invoice is due. Some suppliers offer us discounts to pay in 10 days and I take advantage of that.

There's a lot of work in your own business. Since you are dealing with food, you may have additional work with the FDA and city ordinances.

Don't get me wrong, owning your own company is very rewarding personally and financially. You are your own boss and you call the shots.

Just make sure you follow all guidelines and have good counsel.

Good luck!

I started my own business in 2005, and it depends on the business what you have to do. Some cities require different things. We are oh so "blessed" to have to pay gross receipts fees to BOTH Los Angeles County (where we actually operate) AND Los Angeles City, where live live because we claim a home office. Just do your best to do all your homework BEFORE you get started to make sure you don't get slapped with unnecessary fines and all that. We got reamed by L.A. City after being in business for 3 years, because we thought we were all good paying fed, state, and county taxes and had no idea about the home office thing for LA City until they came after us for claiming a home office on our tax returns. A very unwelcome surprise. Every govt. org certainly wants their share these days.
I did want to encourage you that if for some reason you don't do your own cooking based business and are looking for a part-time home based business, be VERY careful of all the pyramid business out there, like Arbonne, Mary Kay, Xango, Amway, etc., etc. You cannot believe how many people I have known with good intentions that absolutely went overboard trying to "help" me make money as a stay at home mom, by trying to sign me up underneath them for one of those pyramid businesses. Sometimes it was just downright annoying and I had to tell them to stop asking me! Fortunately, I never signed up, as I would watch these women work their butts off, SO SO many hours put in to make very little money for a job that was supposed to give them freedom to be a stay at home mom. Not really the case for them, and in the end, if they really needed part-time income, they had to quit the pyramid thing and just went to work somewhere else like a restaurant or small business and worked set hours part-time with guaranteed income, and so much less stress.
You can make a decent amount of money doing one of those pyramid things, but only if you are willing to work full time hours, which defeats the purpose for most people.
I have a very small business, which I have chosen to keep very small, so as not to take me away too much from my mom and wife duties, and we live very modestly, but we do pay the bills by having the small business in addition to my husband's full time job. So it can be done.
I chose something I know well, and love to do, which sounds like where you are at. Just make sure you really can make the profit you need with the hours you are willing to work. Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

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You would have to bake all your goods in a commercial kitchen. You are not allowed to sell anything to the public that you have made in your home. If you advertise or have a website they will find you and fine you. Heavily.

I answered this earlier but lost my connection and lost it!

Please call your city offices first thing, like right now, to inquire if you are allowed to run a business out of your home. In our Directors classes for NAC certification we had a whole day on running our child care centers better and how to improve them. Part of the class was ladies who were just starting out a child care business.

The teacher said she had many many ladies who would go through all the hoops to get a child care license and even get families coming. A home business going well just to find out from the city that they were going to have to pay huge fines and all sorts of stuff. If you are not in a zoned area for home businesses you have to do that first, get the zoning changed. It takes time because each of your neighbors and anyone in the whole neighborhood can say no and possibly shut the whole thing down.

My child care center was in a residential area too but on a main street off the highway. That is how we got the exception to the home business ordinances. If we had been even a block over or if the neighbors had complained or said no then it would have been denied.

Next you need to find out how much of a remodel of your existing kitchen is going to have to be done. It could be thousands but the health inspector is your person to ask. There are always lots of rumors that say you have to have this or that, get it from the horses mouth. That way when they come to inspect you have their written list in front of you.

These are some things we were required to have. Triple sinks. One for washing, one for rinsing, one for sanitizing. The first one had soapy water, the second was running water for rinsing, no dipping them in a sink of sitting rinse water, the third sink was to have sitting water in it and have a sanitizing agent in it. Ours was bleach water. I think it was 1/8 cup per gallon of water. They were not rinsed after this, they went directly onto the drainer where they air dried. Drying them by hand is extremely nasty and not allowed.

There are other ways of course of cleaning and sanitizing but only the health inspector who does your home matters. If they like bleach than other chemicals may not meet with their approval, if the want just a sterilizing temp water rinse that's pretty easy to meet if your hot water tank settings get it hot enough,

Once you have the information above are are in a zoned area for home businesses and can afford to redo the kitchen I would say making an appointment with an attorney and accountant is next. The attorney will be able to help you file the proper paper work to become a Limited Liability Corporation, an LLC. This will prevent you from losing your home and personal belongings if the company is sued. It will also be the formal step to becoming a business owner.

The meeting with the accountant will cover getting a federal tax ID and getting state income tax taken care of too. They will be able to show you ways of keeping your books in case you get audited or have to show where your money is being spent. They may have some really good ideas for you. So you can keep your business taxes and such ready for the tax guy at tax season.

Go set up your checking account now...lol.

At this point, if your kitchen has passed inspection, your tax info is ready to go, you can start advertising without fear of getting caught and fined, it's time to start buying and advertising.

Now you can start getting orders and filling them. The one thing I will say though is always, always, always, always use your business account for anything to do their supplies for the business. Do not buy a bag of flour and use the personal account. Always set it aside and tell them it's a separate purchase. That will make it so much easier when tax time comes. Plus the bank keeps records of your account and they can help you to get quarterly stuff done.

I really think that any home business that has to do with cooking is a near impossibility for a person who has limited finances.

If I were really trying to make some fast money I would do things like sewing, ironing, take in laundry for a person or two, babysit for someone in their home so it's not a home child care business being run without a license, there are many things you can do to raise money. Once you have the baby and get back on your feet is a great time to start thinking about a home business that would be profitable.

One last thing. Call your local vo-tech and ask them if they have any sort of small business support programs. Ours has one and for something like $100 they will help you go through all the areas and get you on your feet. They will also help you get the record keeping set up, how to figure out your profits and spending, etc... You will be able to claim a portion of your utilities, phones, vehicles, gasoline, and housing costs on your taxes and the accountant will need all that at tax time but the vo-tech program will help you set up record keeping habits to support that.

Good luck! I do hope it works out for you!

Hi. I don't know about the starting a business part, but my friend owns a commercial kitchen facility that you can rent by the hour/day etc., and it includes use of all equipment, if you want to cook or bake on a larger scale. It is called One World Kitchen, 615 Spice Island Drive #4, Sparks, NV 89431. Ph: ###-###-####. Website is www.oneworldkitchen.com. Good luck!