How to Sell a Recipe and Start a Recipe Business

If you have a cherished family recipe that's been passed down through the generations that folks rave about, you may wonder if you can sell the recipe for money? Or maybe you have a fondness for developing new and unusual recipes and want to market them? The good news is there is a viable market for recipes as long as the recipes are unique and hard-to-find. With the easy access to common recipes the internet provides you're probably not going to make a lot of money selling another fried chicken recipe. On the other hand, if you have a never-before-published recipe for an unusual dish, you may find a market for your creation. Here are some tips on selling recipes:

How to sell a recipe: Give away the recipe and sell a product

If you have recipes for dishes that require use of a particular appliance or cookware, it might be more profitable to give away your recipes while promoting the cookware needed to make them. You could set up a small website that lists your recipes along with links to affiliate programs that sell the items needed to make them. Affiliate programs are companies that give you a percentage of all sales you refer to them. To find an affiliate program, you simply do an online search for the name of the product plus affiliate program. For example, if you've developed a delicious line of smoothie recipes, you would set up a website giving away your smoothie recipes. You'd include lots of attractive photos of smoothies and photos of blenders you're promoting to make the recipes. At the end of each recipe would be a link to purchase the blender you recommend. Many internet marketers do quite well with this technique.

How to sell a recipe: Sell recipes through online classifieds

There are some people who have success selling recipes on online classified sites such as Craig's List. The most successful entries seem to be ones who have compiled a collection of several recipes using a specific ingredient, appliance, or technique. For example, here are some of the recipe related classifieds recently on Craig's list:

Grape wine and Homemade Ky. Beer recipes - $5
Quick and simple lasagna recipe - $1

If you can make your recipes sound fresh and appealing and if they can't be easily found on the internet, you may find success with this method. Plus, advertising on many of the online classified sites is free.

How to sell a recipe: Sell the ingredients as a packaged mix or kit

Have you ever walked through a country craft mall and seen little packages containing everything you need to make a cup of soap or a tray of muffins? They're usually packaged quite attractively in country fashion which appeals to the emotions of the person browsing. If you have a recipe where you can readily package the ingredients into a mix or kit, you can sell them at old country stores, craft malls, and craft shows. Try visiting some of these venues and take note of how these entrepreneurs have packaged their offerings. Determine whether or not you can sell your recipe in a similar manner.

Of course there's always the option of packaging your recipes into an ebook or submitting a proposal for a recipe book to a publisher. Cookbooks always seem to have a ready market particularly if it's marketed to a niche audience.

If you love cooking, there are a variety of avenues you can use to sell your recipes. Why not give these ideas a try?