/ck/ - Food & Cooking

Well op I used to work in a bakery owned by merchants. It made them lots of money and is a business model I plan to replicate and optimise some day. It might be far from what you’re looking for in a pizzeria so ignore it if so. We made essentially any and all forms of flatbread, as well as sauces like hummus. The technique for not going bankrupt is as follows - have a shopfront where you sell your base products at a high markup meaning sandwiches and the like and small containers of sauce. Of course sell drinks and the like to regular customers. Now this is barely profitable, so what you do is open up a night shift to make and sell your base products wholesale to nearby (and even faraway) restaurants. Target those that won’t bother to make their own bread products but still need them. You’d be surprised at how little even 5-star hotels make from scratch, and they usually buy a ton from us to freeze for the breakfast buffet anyway. Knowing who buys in bulk and freezes means you can cheekily insert some of the retail stuff that didn’t manage to sell (horrible I know, I didn’t like it). To save on delivery costs you can get employees to make small deliveries to the closer restaurants during downtime. Getting a guy who gives a shit is worth it. I used to get calls from chefs before dinner rush who ran out and I’d crank out a batch of hundreds in <90 minutes (this is the advantage of flatbreads) and deliver it by hand, while getting my subordinates to manage front of house. I did front, back, dishwashing, deliveries, and filing invoices. Calculations and some minor brain activity is involved so be careful about who you hire. If you want to really squeeze your employees get closing shift to be pseudo night shift and prepare a couple batches for wholesale. The vegan movement has truly made life easier since you can sell them cheap food at a high price and they’ll eat it all up. Save money on refrigeration by selling vegan products.

Crust shot 2