If you wants to produce home made food but didn't have a commercial kitchen - would you rent one out?

[whothefuckhas5children]

I'm would love to cook my own food and sell it. However I'd need to keep my own job at present.
And my kitchen is good but not up to commercial standards.

So I thought about 2 options

1. renting a commercial kitchen. Does anyone know if this is a fine thing (doesn't matter what area but just need to know if others have done this before)
2. If I rented a space and then built it into a commercial kitchen would anyone rent it from me for periods of time when I don't need it (kind of like a timeshare for kitchens )

Anyone out there with experience or opinions?

Thanks

I should have proof read - sorry!

I have a friend who makes and sells chutneys. She rents time in an inspected and licensed kitchen at the local church. I’m sure you can do it the other way where you create the kitchen and rent usage time to others. But I guess the latter would require a much higher capital outlay to start the business. Good luck with your new business.

I bake cakes at home for sale and also run a supper club in our dining room. We have a domestic kitchen in a period house, no mod cons but we have a 5* rating, no problems whatsoever.

Are you sure you wouldn't get a rating? We have no stainless steel anywhere and a 1.5 sink with a dishwasher - not separate handwashing sink.

Have you had any advice from environmental health? I found them really helpful.

Unless you are experienced in catering, I would be cautious about throwing too much money into the venture right at the beginning.

We both have our day jobs and the food side has been slow to build, although steady...we have made a profit from day one but mostly because we have incurred little additional cost.

Els1e and veryfoolishfay thanks for that. I have some seed capital for a venture but you make a good point. I'm looking at both aspects - money that I can invest in a business as well as cooking myself.

very how slow is slow to take off if you don't mind me asking?

We did our first supper club last April and we do one or two most months. The cakes tend to be more popular during the summer. It's very organic and we tend to use a mixture of social media and parish magazines to advertise.

Thanks. Best of luck with it

Commercial kitchen shares are a 'thing' in the USA, I know a few people who rent a kitchen to bake cakes/bread etc to sell. Really good idea; some are specifically built to rent out and some use a restaurant kitchen or whatever whilst not otherwise in use.

I would love to have found somewhere like this. Maybe put some queries on local FB pages, both for a place for you to use and also to see if others would be interested in a kitchen share if you built a place.

Local authorities seem to vary wildly on the standards they need met. Ours insists on stainless steel, separate hand wash and separate fridges (one for home use and one for things you intend to sell and their ingredients) But, if you give them a call they are usually very happy to advise you as to the way forward.

Good luck!

The suitability of your own kitchen at the moment might depend on the scale of your operations.

An accountant friend told me he had advised over 300 clients on food businesses and only 3 were still in operation. That's why I am content to grow incrementally!

And isn't it the business rather than just the kitchen that gets the rating? Otherwise you could be using a commercial kitchen but have no personal idea about food hygiene and safety.

All good points. Must have a dig around on courses for food safety etc. I'm going to look into this more. Thank you all for your input.