How To Start Your Own Wedding Catering Business: Step-By-Step Guide
A wedding catering business is a profitable business that you can venture into and make good ends meet. If you are a good cook and you enjoy cooking, why not consider starting a small catering business? Are you someone with an entrepreneurial spirit and like to host parties for your family and friends every chance you get? If your answer is yes, then consider starting a wedding catering business. In this business, you have the advantage of starting small with relatively low overhead.
Also read: How to build your business from scratch
You can build and scale your catering business as you gain more clients. Search for information on how to find your niche, launch your business, and serve the people. What licenses are needed to start a catering business? Find out about the existence of such a license and work to acquire it. There are certain things you need to start a wedding catering business. In this article, we have highlighted all you need to start a successful catering business.
You have to understand that you are a good cook will not guarantee you have a successful catering company. It would be best if you had a step-by-step pre-launch research plan to improve your chances of success.
Step-By-Step Guide For Starting Your Wedding Catering Business
First Step: Research the marketplace
The number one thing you must before starting your wedding catering business is to research other people offering the same services in your area. You need to check out your competitor’s menus, their prices, list of services, and customers. Also, visit their website to identify their peculiar selling benefits. It would be best if you did not think that successful caterers sell only food. The truth is that you will start with food, but why should customers seek your services instead of going elsewhere.
People planning their wedding can get good food from varieties of local providers. Why should they patronize you? When people shop for catering, you should know that they look for more than just-food. They are also looking for a benefit. To be a successful caterer, you also need to sell convenience, unique menus, white-glove service, affordability, etc.
If you wish to go into an in-home catering business for private parties, reach out to your friends with a short survey. Not just your friends also send inquiries to people within your locality. Ask if they use catering services and what they like about the service providers. Market research is indispensable for launching a successful wedding catering business.
Second Step: Identify your potential customers
You already know who your customers are since you are starting a wedding catering business. The fact that you engage in wedding ceremonies should not stop you from considering other customers like corporate businesses. Go out of your comfort zone and seek out customers from different spheres of life.
Seek out your peers in the business community to know what their companies look for in caterers. This task will help you understand what your potential customers want. In cases where you don’t have personal contacts to help you, you can cold-call a few potential customers. When you call, let them know you are not selling anything but want to inquire about what they would like caterers to offer. You must take the time to find the appropriate person at each company to contact. If you fail to do it that way, you are likely going to get the brush-off.
This approach will help you get the necessary information about the services that corporate customers want other than food. You will get to understand how these corporate companies budget for catering. It will help you launch your catering business with the benefits you know your customers want, instead of the ones you think they want.
Third Step: Handle all logistics on small business basics
As an entrepreneur going into the catering business, there are individual startups tasks that you need to perform. What licenses are required to start a catering business? Find out what you need to start a catering business. These include acquiring your business permit from your city or town, wetting up your website and email, considering setting up a corporation, and buying liability insurance. Also, check your home owner’s association rules. You should also check to see if your business will meet any zoning requirements.
Also see: Top 10 business ideas for young entrepreneurs
Contact your state department of health to know how to get a food service license. Get to know all you need to do to ensure your kitchen, storage, transportation, and all serving equipment meets the necessary standards. There are certain places that you are required to take a course on becoming a certified food manager. You can also hire one to prepare and serve your food.
Fourth Step: Write a well-detailed business plan
Every entrepreneur needs to have a well-detailed business plan. Your business plan will serve as a roadmap to guide you in the course of your business journey. If you work on it one piece at a time, a business plan is quite easy to write. You can outsource it to a professional if you don’t have the time to put up a good business plan. Check here to see how to write a business plan.
Conclusion
Starting your own wedding catering business requires you to be well prepared to be successful. Starting a business is not a stroll in the park, so you have to be prepared to do the work involved. Wedding ceremonies are happening virtually every week. So you are sure of the profitability of the business provided you do the needful, as highlighted in this article.
