What equipment do I need to start a fruit bouquet business and how much will it cost?

This is a popular question I'm asked by budding fruit bouquet makers.  The answer depends on WHERE you're setting up your new business.

If you're starting a fruit bouquet business from home, your overheads are going to be significantly lower than if you're setting up a retail business.

At home, you'll need to comply with health and hygiene regulations - but that doesn't necessarily mean that you have to have a production kitchen.  It just means that you need to keep your home kitchen separate to your business kitchen - and that may mean that you just need to get a separate washing up bowl that you wash your lettuce and fruit in (instead of your normal sink) and a separate fridge (I'd go for the biggest, tallest fridge you can get!).

Setting up a fruit bouquet business can be as inexpensive as you can make it.   For example, nothing dictates that you need brand new equipment, so why not find a good second hand fridge in working order.   As long as you have a thermometer in your fridge to record the correct temperature, then that's all you need.

The important aspect of running any catering business, is HYGIENE.   You need to make sure that you run a professional, safe and hygienic environment for your business.  Having a cat walking over worktops is not ideal or conducive to running any food business!

Having a large van, sign-written, is great advertising
When I started my own fruit bouquet business, Tooty Fruity, I worked from a home kitchen.  It was very large, so I was extremely lucky to be able to separate out the kitchen and put a stainless steel work bench and separate fridge in place.   I also bought a tall larder fridge (second hand) and put that in my garage to store assembled bouquets, just prior to delivery, and any perishable fruit such as strawberries.

10% of income came from people seeing the Tooty Fruity van!
My biggest investment was a transit van.   I wanted mobile advertising and so I purchased a second hand, white transit van and then had the largest graphics produced and put them on the side of it.   About 10% of my advertising leads came from people just seeing the van driving around each day!

Setting up a fruit bouquet business from home is a low-cost, start up business.   You can realistically set up the business for less than £1,000 and be making money as soon as word gets out that you're in business!   Word of mouth marketing is the best form for this type of business and the way to the heart is definitely through the mouth!

For more information, please visit:  www.tooty-fruity.com

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