How to Start Your Own Business: Opening a Dessert Bakery
Did you catch the baking bug in lockdown and want to introduce your skills to a wider audience? Or have you trained as a professional pastry chef and have ambitions to open your very own storefront? If so, there is lots to know about opening a bakery or dessert shop, from putting together a business plan, to acquiring the necessary licenses, to establishing smooth day-to-day operations. In this guide, we’ll cover the key steps involved in opening a successful dessert bakery so that you can focus on delighting consumers with your sweet confections.
Creating a Pastry Shop Business Plan
Perhaps the most important thing—after your baking skills, of course—is coming up with a solid business plan informed by local market trends and data. We recommend doing some research to better understand the market in your area, who the competition is, and what consumers are interested in.
Next, you’ll want to define your bakery concept. For example, are you interested in making traditional pastries, elaborate cakes for events, health-focused products, or specialty items like gluten-free bakes? This concept will be the foundation on which you can make other vital decisions, like branding, menu, and location.
Let’s not forget the financial side of things. Your business plan should also include details about initial expenditures like equipment and ingredient costs, your monthly budget, a pricing strategy, and revenue projections. Ultimately, this planning will help you make smart decisions about the scale and scope of your business and set you up for sweet success.
Bakery Business Essentials, from Equipment to Licenses
You need more than a knack for pastry-making or cake decorating to open a new business: there is a lot of equipment needed to start a small bakery, including commercial-grade ovens and fridges, mixers, prep stations, proofing cabinets, and display cases to show off your yummy goods. Spend some time researching and talking to industry experts to find trusted suppliers for this in-house equipment as well as for consumables like ingredients and packaging. Prior to the big opening day, you’ll also need to know what licenses are needed to start a bakery or dessert shop. The exact requirements will vary from state to state (and even county to county), but in general these are the licenses you will need to apply for:
Business license: a government-issued document that will allow you to operate in a specific location
Food service license: a mandatory license issued by local county health departments
Employer Identification Number (EIN): this is required by the IRS for tax identification purposes
Sales tax license: this is necessary if you are required to collect sales tax on your baked goods
Food handler certificate: in many states, this type of permit is required for all workers that handle food
Signage permits: depending on local laws, you may need a permit to install signage outside your storefront
Marketing Your Sweet Creations
No matter how delicious your cookies or cakes are, a good marketing strategy is an essential part of attracting new customers. A multi-pronged approach that combines in-person marketing with an online presence is a good bet for acquainting locals and potential visitors with your shop. When marketing your bakery, the product should come first, so be sure to share a variety of high-quality images of your baked goods. For additional engagement you can also share behind the scenes video content showcasing how your unique creations come to life on platforms like Instagram and TikTok.
We also recommend getting involved in the local community by participating in or sponsoring local events, collaborating with other businesses for unique pop-ups, or selling your sweet or savory bakes at the local farmer's market.
Establish a Seamless Day to Day
Once all the pieces needed to open your bakery are falling into place, it’s time to start thinking about the day-to-day operations. This involves assembling a good team (i.e. bakers, decorators, service staff). Unless you are running a one-person operation, you’ll need to teach your back-of-house staff your secret recipes and give everyone a primer on your operational standards.
Speaking of operations, most food businesses nowadays benefit from using a POS system, which dramatically streamlines daily tasks like placing orders and tracking inventory, as well as weekly or monthly admin like sales reporting and menu management.
With SumUp’s POS solution, you can easily input and share custom orders with your baking team, as well as track product and ingredient levels as orders are completed. With our solution’s built-in CRM, you can also enhance your customer’s experience with loyalty programs that treat them based on their number of visits or money spent. Offering a special promotion or introducing a seasonal menu item is easy as pie with a smart POS, as is tracking the success of these initiatives.
As we’ve seen, there are many ingredients involved in opening up a new bakery, including a business plan, licensing, supplier network, marketing strategy, and POS system. If mixed just right, these ingredients can make something truly magical: a new business that is set up for success.
To learn more about how SumUp’s POS can help take your new business to the next level, book a free demo today.
