Can Portland Support a $50/hr Rental Kitchen?

Yes, I’m back, well at least for now. Time will tell. As you can see, something incited me to put fingers to keyboard. I almost titled this post “The dudette does not abide”, but in the interest of not attracting just Jeff Bridges fans, I thought better of it.

When I was still living in NYC and doing cost analysis for whether it was feasible to get my business off the ground there (which, it wasn’t), commissary (or rentable commercial kitchen) time was running about $25 an hour. Yes, costs have gone up everywhere so I imagine the same space, if it was available would be closer to $50/hr. However, everything is relative to location and what the market will bear.

So let’s do some math, I’m assuming you’re just starting out or have been in business for a short time. Let’s take the $50/hr as a base hourly rent you’re paying for kitchen rental space. Now let’s assume you’ve budgeted rent as 20% of your forecasted income (Note: everyone has their own formula of how much rent/sales ratio should be, I’ve seen it as low as 8% and high as 32%). This means you need to produce $250 an hour of product, outside of additional labor, food costs, and packaging.

Perhaps you’re a cake baker, and selling your cakes wholesale at $25. Can you bake, cool and frost/finish 10 cakes an hour to stay with your budgeted percentage? Say you’re scheduled for a four hour kitchen rental - $200. That’s $1000 of product (or 40 cakes).

The pricing could work a little better if you were a caterer and only needed 4 hours to put together a $1500 event, where your margins tend to be higher than wholesale.

Is there a market demand in the Portland area for this level of pricing? Time will tell, and if so, prepare to have your favorite $2 coffeehouse cookie set you back $4. 

Nothing Was Fishy…The Case(s) Of The Would-Be Food Business Owners

Why yes, a garlic scape does make a decorative hat band!

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been privy to a couple of diametrically different conversations about starting and running a food business, both unsolicited. I’m always willing to proffer an opinion or point people in a direction when I’m able to. (Note to those seeking advice - while I’m happy to help, please email prior to picking up the phone and calling especially on weekends, some of us aren’t up at the crack of dawn on Saturday mornings (or Sunday for that matter)).

The recap below shows that everyone approaches solutions and what motivates them differently (esp. in different stages of business). Do you think one of these has a better chance?

Business One: Owner is just in the getting off the ground stage, with a business idea that  is a take off from something they’re currently doing for an employer. They’re in the research and planning stage, where the owner has investigated the market viability (which looks positive) and is looking at costs for getting the project off the ground. This person (the owner) wanted a little guidance as to where to begin figuring out what they’d need for infrastructure and permits for getting to the next stage (which includes perhaps building our their own production space). I was left with the impression that this person was motivated enough to do whatever it took to get their idea to fruition (and had the support of their loved ones to do it). I think they were also burnt out from their current gig.

Business Two: Owner has been in business for about three years with a ready to eat product, and has had some big ups and downs with their product in the marketplace (including a café which opened and shuttered quickly). Owner is at a loss as to how to keep going and seemed somewhat unwilling to accept that they are the one that needs to keep their company moving forward. At this point, putting the company up for sale would probably not be feasible (they’re renting a facility, and the market value of the customers might not garner much). I’m not sure what they had in terms of a support network of friends and family. I told this person that they might want to look for a partner who was more sales oriented to foster some growth. There is no easy answer to keeping a business going without the willingness to put in the effort.

I don’t pretend to have all the answers (mostly opinions), and part of being willing to talk to people seeking advice is to gain my own perspective on issues and ideas. The post I wrote about renting commercial kitchen space is still the top visited post here. Wonder if that’ll change when I post about our newest fruit tart flavor…. 

The Gang of Three… Quibble, Quandary, Quest

I'm not usually a good scrabble player, however using big point words seemed a fitting way to wrap up some experiences of the past few weeks. 

Quibble: The Boundaries of Local

Recently, I’ve been traveling outside of our “region” (ok state) in hopes to grow our sales and distribution of tarts. In Oregon/Portland and somewhat in Washington/Seattle, (depending on who you talk to), our products are considered local. But if you fly 1000 (or more) miles, somewhere mid-air, we cross the boundaries of “local” and are seen as “sustainable” (and “clean”) products*. Neither are specific or constraining, it’s simply a different mindset when pitching our tarts to buyers. Overall, the response to our tarts has been positive and everyone is supportive of using local resources to produce them.

Quandary: The Economy and Continuing Closing of Businesses

In the past four weeks, two of my small business friends in town have closed up shop (literally). Both were retail food businesses (in two different sectors). One just had enough (a future longer post about this is pending) of the long hours and no income. The other had been trying to wait out their lease and hang on with no luck. Yes, these things happen and most of the times work out for the best in the end, but they still can be unnerving for other small business owners like myself as no business is immune. However, I think there is always something to be learned from these situations, and they both walked away with insight and experience that could be useful in their next thing.

Quest: The Fruit Tart Flavor Which Reigns Supreme

It’s been about 8 weeks since we’ve launched our line of fruit tarts. As we started out with three flavors, strawberry, cherry and ginger peach, they’ve all been selling strongly (based on how many cases have been ordered). The cherry one has been slightly more popular, but not by much, maybe 5% in the past weeks. I’m enjoying the fact they’re all neck and neck so to speak, I think we’ve hit a good range launching with something for everyone.

* As an interesting note, Whole Foods Markets defines local as anything within a 7 hour truck/driving range. 

How Do You Like Dem Tomatahs? Comments On This Week's News

I couldn’t let this story pass by without commenting on it, and anyone in the farming or food industry will understand why. This past week $250,000 (yes a quarter of a million dollars) worth of tomato crop were stolen from a farmer in Florida. You can find the (free) article here via ABC.

While I am relieved we’re not having food riots in our country, a great tomato heist like this shows us how much of a commodity our food has become. Our food prices are directly tied to fuel (eg the cost of gas), growing conditions, and calamities going on in the world (whomever has had a flood, freeze, drought or earthquake is purchasing food from us).

Additionally, it brings to mind a few questions (and some comments):

Where are you going to fence said tomatoes? (they were originally destined for Wendy’s)

“Psstt… hey mister… these nice tomatoes just fell off the back of the truck”. I suspect if the thieves went through such trouble to set-up a fake company, they already had a buyer in store so to speak.

What does this do to our efforts to have more traceability in our food? Doesn’t matter where they were destined, would you eat one knowing it was stolen not knowing how it was handled (though by now you know where it was grown)?

Which brings me to think if it had been beef or pork, there would’ve been a nationwide man-hunt out to stop it from getting into our food system

This very well might not be the last time we hear a story like this. Next time you’re at one of your local farmers markets (ours are just starting up) remember what a commodity your local farmers truly are to your own dinner table.

Lessons From Having Too Much Make-Up On In Daylight… or Why It’s Important to Understand Your Customers

Like many industries, the cosmetics industry holds a twice yearly products showcases where they invite consumers to take a seat and try out some make-up and skincare products. The local location of Nordstrom was hosting one over the weekend.

Our tarts are considered higher-end existing in the “gourmet” and “artisanal” food sections of stores and deli cases (and in many cases “grab & go”). How does this tie in to a few hours at the cosmetics counter you ask? I thought it would be interesting to compare how other industries market and present higher end products to the consumer (which sometimes, is me) and see if I could gain anything from the experience.

I decided my skin and my patience could handle two product samplings from two very different skin care and cosmetic companies, with two very different results.

Cosmetic company one: In the world of higher end skin care, a mid-tier line which touts their botantical ingredients and environmental stewardship.

Upon sitting down, the product associate asks me one question about my skin (oily? Normal? Dry?) then proceeds to wipe off the small amount of make-up I had applied that morning and lather my face with products, stopping only to give me the briefest overview about what she was using and why it would be good for me. I will admit, at one point my skin was silky soft, but I could not tell you how many products it took to get there, or did I have an inkling if I would be interested in any of the products she chose. After an abbreviated make-up session (most of their color pallets were a little too natural for my liking), and a product card outlining several times daily skin care products and regimes, it was time to move on.

Cosmetic company two: (after a side trip to the ladies room to wipe down a bit of the first company) A definitely high end marketed line, lots of glossy magazine advertising touting a certain lifestyle and products to match.

Upon sitting down the product associate asks me what products I currently use, what I’m concerned about and how much time would I like to spend looking at their products (it’s free and I’m sitting, what’s the rush?). She showed me a few tiers of skin care products, making recommendations but allowing me to choose if I wanted to have it applied. End result pre-make-up was also silky smooth skin and I knew how we had gotten there. I allowed her to have some fun with make-up, since I so rarely really deck myself out these days, and I thought the eye-treatment she did was fabulous. Had I had the budget to acquire some of the products, this associate would have gotten a few sales.

The experience reinforced the importance of listening to your customer, offering them solutions and while giving them options to choose from. And while your product may not be the right solution for them now, leaving them with a good taste and feeling about your products leaves the door open for possible sales in the future.

This has me wondering, what sort of situations have turned you off from purchasing a product (in any industry)? 

Been Caught Stealing... The Past Few Weeks Digested in List

I’m stealing, erm, borrowing the format of this post from another blog post I read recently (maybe even today). It’s well published enough the interwebs will show it to you if you hunt around.

Instead of rolling with a quiet January (and into Feb) while you all were on diets and budgets, we’ve been embracing it by doing some new product development. I’m not ready to talk about what it is yet because 1) I want them to be in production for a few weeks first and 2) I’m working on perhaps having the local press actually give it some, um, press.

However, here’s a list of how my weeks have gone:

1. Sample commercially produced versions of like products. Hmmm…
2. Source some sample ingredients. Tour of Trader Joes, Fred Meyer, New Seasons. Try not to buy other ingredients not related to project (like Candy Cane Jo Joe’s)
3. Create sample recipes
4. Taste with staff. Hmmm… Refine.
5. Create next batch of sample recipes
6. Taste. Taste with staff. Too much acid pucker… Refine.
7. Create next batch of samples recipes.
8. Taste. Taste with staff. Wooo… we like those.
9. Source more sample ingredients. Tour of Trader Joes, Fred Meyer, New Seasons. Try not to buy other ingredients not related to project (like Pirate’s Booty which is on sale)
10. Recreate batches of recipes to be production candidates. How much of what did I put in that again?
11. Write down better recipes, notes, tips and tricks. Scale to larger batch sizes.
12. Make batches of production candidates again. 
13. Taste. Yup. Got it.
14. Email clients, talk about pitch and set-up dates and times to present samples.
15. Create production candidate samples to give out at said dates and times.
16. Think about where to store new ingredients. Rearrange one of the freezers. Harvest out ghosts of projects past.
17. Look at paperwork that goes with product launch. Think about marketing materials.
18. Ignore paperwork, eat extra samples.
19. Remember I owe accountant some forms for how-grateful-am-I-2010-is-ovah filings.
20. Eat more samples.

Enjoy the pic of the building across the street from us. I shot it with an iPod camera which is marginally better than my current cellphone. Still working on it… but perhaps more another bite?

Lost in the Supermarket… Where are all the Food Entrepreneurs?

I read a lot of blogs (when time permits), mostly business, some cooking or food related, a few just for an escapist view into other people’s lives. In the past few weeks everyone has been posting trends, goals and things to accomplish in 2011. What’s struck me about much of my reading is, none of them I saw were posted by people who own food companies (ours are still forthcoming, though I admit they’ve morphed a bit in the past few weeks).

A quick search on Delicious, Google and Mashable (alright, maybe a longer search, there was a lot to look through), shows thousands of food blogs. Recipes, grocery store, farmers markets and product review sites abound.

I think the process of how my company transforms and grows creates quite a bit of fodder for content (and some days pilots for sitcoms) and while I don’t always have time to put fingers to keyboard I wish there had been blogs like mine out there when I was getting started. I’d be interested in reading some of what are others who are creating food products are going through today.

Every industry has their unique challenges related to their business - regulations, getting to market, sourcing suppliers and building a client base come to mind. We can’t all be out there doing this alone.

So, if owning, launching or running a food company is everyone’s new “go to” business… why aren’t more food companies blogging themselves?

And I’m Always on the Run… Five Favorite (Fast) Foods of 2010 (in PDX)

As one can imagine, I spend part of my days (weeks) driving to client deliveries, meetings and just running around in general. In reality, I am my own ultimate client searching for great tasting food to grab on the run. When I’m not munching on our own tarts, here are a few of my favorite fast treats from the past year.

Pain Au Chocolat, Florio Bakery. Carrie Birrer & staff do a great job turning out flakey goodness in pastry form from their small bakery in North Portland and their pain au chocolate (chocolate croissant) is certainly worth stopping by and saying hello for.  

Vegetable Bahn Mi, Best Baguette. Bahn Mi really nails the fast, cheap & good trifecta of food. It’s even more appealing that they have a drive through, allowing for even faster food while on the run. The mixture of tofu and vegetables (usually carrots and taro or radish) is well seasoned with enough dressing to offset the bulkiness of the bread. If you see someone driving down 82^nd with a long white sandwich bag protruding from their mouth, it’s probably me.

Caramel with Salted Dark Chocolate Ice Cream, Ruby Jewel Scoop Shop. I’m hot, I’m cranky or I’m tired (and cranky or maybe just cranky) and like a little kid, ice cream will hit the spot and while maybe not make everything better, a sure heck of a lot sweeter. I’m a big fan of Lisa, Becky & Co. and when they decided to open physical ice cream shop I hoped we’d see other great ice cream creations from them. I was not disappointed. The caramel with salted dark chocolate ice cream is like an adult sundae in a scoop, creamy, salty chocolately… just don’t let me buy a pint! 

Roasted Mushroom Sandwich, Meat Cheese Bread. For a sandwich shop that specializes in their namesake, the menu item which is generally my only menu option, has turned into a favorite. (Though it’s a bit messy, I don’t recommend trying to eat this one while driving).  See my previous post about why I enjoy this sandwich (then go get yourself one!).

Where would Portland be without coffee? Something needs to cut through our damp gray winters and a cup of Mudd Works Mudd House will have you bright, upright and ready to conquer your day. I tend to grab a cup when I’m at Mr French’s Coffee Kitchen (a friend and a fave coffee house client of ours). 

Judging from above, I’m fairly well-fueled for our week (and working on our 2011 goals). The downside is, the tart mobile could really use a good vacuuming! 

There’s No Crying In Baseball (Jumping in on the End of Year Wrap-Ups)

Photo by Allison Jones

The past year has been frightening enlightening, and while we reached for our goals (like some below), it was tough not to get sidelined by every hurdle, sand storm and trial by fire this tough economy has thrown at us. In many ways, it’s made me a far better manager and (I think) stronger business owner, while reminding myself if running a business was easy, everyone would be doing it.

So, how did we match up to my goals for 2010? My philosophy with the goals to make some progression large or small, keeping our momentum moving forward.

Here’s a brief recap of a few of them:

Gluten-Free Tarts: Soft launching and test marketing a gluten-free line of tarts. From past posts you can tell we spent time (lots of time), working out our gluten-free crust. The response has been highly positive - to the point of a few emails from fans crankily succinctly requesting we add them to our online store. Working out how support a larger scale production of them (which includes investing in some additional equipment) will be part of 2011.

Expanding our Social Media: I’m social! I really am, if you were sitting next to me in a bar, on a plane or in the stall next to us at a farmer’s market, would you hear an ear-full about all sorts of things. Just starting this blog was a huge step. I like the tweet and try not to over load anyone who likes us on Facebook. I aim to tell you more about our company culture, what we are working towards and what I like/dislike. A content plan is something to aspire to, until then, I’m shooting off the cuff.

Growing our Distribution/Sales Region: The year was about loss and gain. We lost some of our smaller coffee house clients but in turn upped our sales and distribution a bit to larger clients (I’m not going to say our sales wildly grew, however I see a chance at a turning point in making gains). We’re dipping our toe into the Seattle market (w/PCC Natural Foods) and we’ll see where this takes us. 

As the year wraps up, I’m pretty grateful that I was able to keep us floating through. More than a few of my peers can’t say the same, and while there’s no crying in baseball, every small business owner has some emotional attachment to the thing they’ve built and some days, just opening the door and turning the lights on is the largest (and most satisfying) goal achievement.

2011 goals are rattling around and being vetted, then we’ll be social. Really!

Oh, and a friendly elf promised me a new phone soon, so with a better camera you might actually get some decent pics to peruse. Progress, eh?

Am (Not) Public Speaking Goddess… New Seasons Market Hawthorne Store Opening

A few weeks ago I received a call from one of New Season’s marketing staff asking if I’d be willing to say a few words at their new Hawthorne store grand opening. New Seasons is a very supportive (and large) client of ours, so of course I would want to participate in their grand opening in some fashion. In my mind I assumed there would be a few of local companies invited to speak…no, I was the only one (the other speaker outside of Lisa Sedlar the CEO was from FISH a local food bank partner).

While you might be thinking “eh, what’s the big deal, it’s just a grocery store”, the fact that I/LPPCo. (one of many possible local vendors) was asked to be part of the event, speaks volumes about the importance of building great relationships with your clients. And really, I was excited and thrilled to be able to support such a great client back.

Many of you following along outside Portland (and some that weren’t able to attend), ask for some pictures and wanted to know what I said. Below is the excerpt, in which I tried not to bumble and stumble through - along with a few pic’s.

Photo by Jill Oppenheim

When Lisa was introducing Little Pots & Pans Co. & myself, she touched upon why I don't call our tarts pasties (pah-sties). Perhaps she read our blog post. Below she's standing on a step-stool to project over the crowd (and is not actually 7ft tall!).

Photo by Jill Oppenheim

Here's the text of what I said:

Good Morning, What an exciting day to be part of the New Season’s community!

The Daily Grind, who was formerly here, holds a special place in our company history as they were one of LPPCo.’s first clients. When New Season’s announced they were taking over this area for their next store, I knew it would be an opportunity to come full circle in offering the community a local grocery store filled with unmatchable local products.

It’s only been a couple of years that we’ve had the opportunity to work along side the talented team at New Seasons Markets who are consistently remarkable in their support of locally produced sustainable products and are truly interested in building relationships with their vendors.

My own relationship created the opportunity for Little Pots & Pans Co. to produce custom holiday themed fruit tarts and pies, adding to New Season’s already enticing offerings.

Today is an exciting day for us at LPPCo., not only am I thrilled to be here as part of the New Season’s Markets Hawthorne small vendor family, we are also celebrating our own 5^th year anniversary this week as a company.

I look forward to growing my relationship with the New Seasons Hawthorne team members and wish them all the success they deserve in this fantastic new location!

You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby. Five Lessons I’ve Learned in the Past Five Years.

As we progress as a company, everyday I learn something new in running Little Pots & Pans Co. While most days, I feel like that old cigarette ad “you’ve come a long way, baby”, it hasn’t been without learning a few lessons along the way.

Sometimes these lessons come gracefully and sometimes they drop on you like the anvil in an old cartoon scenario (Beep! Beep!). The best you can do is absorb the knowledge, take it in stride and keep moving forward. Below is a selection of five, which, um, struck me.

Business is not predictable.

Really, if the past 18 –24 months have taught us anything, it’s to expect the unexpected. We’ve seen sales rise with some clients only to loose others along the way. It’s not always an even one to one, and just because you’re on an upward trend doesn’t mean there won’t (or can’t) be a dip.

There will be snap decisions, go with your gut.

We are still small, and moving fast. Opportunities, ideas, recommendations present themselves and can’t always wait for analysis, review and/or discussion. Trust that you’re making the right decision. You know your vision and your company best.

You can never have enough cash.

I could have five times the cash banked in our company bank accounts and I’d want more. There’s always an expenditure lurking on the horizon. Equipment breaks, you need more inventory/equipment/employees to increase sales. Unfortunately, item #1 has a direct effect on what can be in the bank at any given time.

HR is it’s own special entity. 

I’ve come to appreciate people in the past who uphold a company’s policy, screen candidates, deal with hiring and firing (and all the associated paperwork). It becomes necessary at a certain point and I’ll take it as a sign we are growing.

Embrace risk.

You can’t run a business without embracing a certain amount of risk. Everyday presents a challenge and if you’re not able to take some leaps of faith with your risk to gain ground or reach for a business success, you’re not the right person to run it. (This is not to say I don’t lose sleep some nights agonizing over said leaps of faith).

I’ve certainly grown a lot in the past five years with the company, and while we’ve come a long way, I quite expect, we still have a long ways to go. I’m already working on the next post of five things… 

The Recipe Outgrew the Apron. Reflections from the Past 5 Years.

Our first recipe book.

When I launched Little Pots & Pans Co. 5 years ago, I started small, dipping our toes into the product development side of the grocery business. Testing out assumptions I had made about tart product varieties and pricing, and watching our (then clients their customers reactions to us.

I began working by myself in a rented kitchen at night. (Insert your Jewish yenta/Italian grandmother here – oye! It was dark! oye! It was a lot of work! oye! You never called/wrote/came to visit!) But then one day I realized perhaps I could afford a little help. Someone to come in and help with production, making the nights smoother and less lonely.

Prior to beginning to sell our tarts, much of my recipe development took place between my home kitchen and the commercial kitchen I was renting. At home, I have one taste-tester, in the kitchen there were at least 4-5 other companies working at any time that I could call upon to proffer input. (Don’t get me started on the um, challenges of trying to work in an over crowded kitchen with everyone clamoring to use the same equipment for their production and still only put in a 7 hour night).

Both were a big help in finalizing our original set of recipes, but as it still just me working, my notes were sort of my own. Some modifications got written down, some didn’t, I knew what each one was, and how each filling should taste. It wasn’t much different than holding up your grandmother’s apron and reverse engineering her recipe for brownies (or red sauce) from it.

The first person I ever had help out in the kitchen, showed up on the first night, ready to go. I pointed her to where the knives and a cutting board were and what she would be making. Her first question… “Is there a recipe for this somewhere?”

I still have a penchant for jotting recipes down on paper, with notes and revisions (some things get typed, some don’t). But I do keep some plastic shelves around to drop them into so at least their staying power has a fighting chance while I fight for time to properly type them up. 

A Tart and a Toaster Walk Into A Grocery Store… (Tales from Tart Sampling)

At some point prior to starting Little Pots & Pans Co., I must have been sitting on my couch thinking… ‘You know, these 48 hours in between Friday and Monday are really too much, there must be something I can do with all this time’. Now I find myself spending many Saturdays traveling around to our customers promoting our tarts and handing out samples.

One of the best ways to get people to try your product is to hand out samples. There are several ways to do this – provide extra product to your client for them to give out, hire a professional (and supply them with product) to do in store sampling, or do it yourself.

The upside to being on site is that no one knows your product better than you, and it’s easy to let your passion and enthusiasm show. The reality side is that sometimes your own experience ends up seeming like a rendition of one of those home video shows.

People love trying free samples, to many it’s a veritable buffet, some stop and are truly interested and others avoid the table like you were going to demand something untowards from them. For the people who stop and try our samples, I’m just happy to get them tasting as I do see it generating interest.

I get all sorts of questions and comments, most very encouraging and positive but some that just have you wondering. Some of that fall on that side include:

“ This would be great with some cheese” (the sampler selected the only vegan sample on the table)

“I’m dieting, I really shouldn’t” (sampler ate multiples of all flavors on the table)

“There’s no flour in this, right?” (After asking what the crust was made of)

“What are the blue speckles in the crust?” (We add black pepper to our vegan dough)

The odd questions help shape how we talk about our tarts, what we should be saying (or perhaps not). And, since my weekend is less than 48 hours, at least there’s a chance of some humor to it.