Starting a Home-Based Personal Chef Business

Everyone appreciates a good, home-cooked meal after a long day at the office. Unfortunately, many people are too tired to bother cooking after working all day and then battling the evening commute. Personal chefs solve this problem by preparing meals at their customer's home and leaving the prepared meals in the refrigerator or freezer.

The United States Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) occupational projections data reports that there more than 108,000 chefs and head cooks in the USA during 2008. Median annual wages for head chefs and cooks is reported to be "high" at $38,770, though earnings for personal chefs have been reported to be considerably higher. 7.6 percent of these chefs and cooks were self-employed.

Getting Started

Starting a personal chef business does not require a lot of investment. Personal chefs cook and prepare meals at their customer's home. This means that the personal chef could use the customer's cookware and kitchen utensils.

Many personal chefs maintain their own portable cooking kit that they bring with them to various homes though. Bringing along your own cooking kit allows you to prepare food and cook with your own utensils and cookware rather than needing to locate the items at a customer's home - and hoping that the customer even has what is needed.

Personal chefs may charge by the hour or by the meal. Personal chefs also may include the price of food in the hourly or meal cost, or they may charge for food separately.

Personal chefs frequently prepare meals for an entire week while they are at a home. Prepared meals can then be placed in the refrigerator or freezer as appropriate. Preparation and heating instructions should be left for the customer.

Starting a personal chef business will require good cooking skills, a decent collection of recipes, and some knowledge of nutrition. Customers may request assistance with planning balanced meals or may have special dietary needs due to medical conditions like diabetes, kidney disease or heart disease. A working knowledge or nutritional guidelines and food nutritional values will help with planning.

Marketing

Setting up a business website for your personal chef business can make it easy for customers to find your business. The website also provides a great place to post some articles about nutrition and cooking, to display photos of meals that you can prepare, and to list information about menus, rates, and schedules.

Business cards and brochures can be helpful marketing tools. These can be passed out to interested people, distributed at public events where you have a table, or posted in office parks or office buildings.

Writing a column for the local or community newspaper can be a great way to attract new customers. Writing about nutrition, menus, or food-related news can improve your image as a food professional and generate new customers without any additional effort on your part.

Entering a favorite recipe or dish in food contests at fairs or bazaars can be a great way to bring attention to your personal chef business. These venues often attract hundreds or thousands of people from the local community. This provides a great way to interact with potential customers and to promote your business.

Donating a meal or cooked goods at a community fundraiser or benefit can also be a great way to attract interest in your personal chef business. These type of events are noticed by many people and will result in a lot of publicity for your business. Participating in a fundraiser or benefit also creates good will toward your business from the participants who see your business helping the community.

Cautions

Create and maintain a careful schedule. Customers will probably not be pleased to arrive home only to find that you have overbooked and were not able to prepare their meals.

Contact your local and state health departments about any regulations governing personal chefs. Personal chefs may be exempt from certain health department regulations in your state since the meals are prepared in the customer's home rather than in a commercial kitchen. Food safety practices should always be followed though to prevent food-borne illnesses.

Business liability insurance may be a good idea since this is a food service business. Liability insurance can help to protect you in the unfortunate event of a food-borne illness sickening a customer.

Conclusion

Starting a home-based, personal chef business can be a great business opportunity for the entrepreneur with good culinary skills. Since cooking and food preparation is done at customer's homes this business is much easier and less expensive to start than many food service businesses.

SOURCES

United States Department of Labor. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Site accessed on 7 October 2010.

Deborah Crawford. Starting a Business as a Personal Chef. Bella Online. Site accessed on 3 December 2010.

Become a Personal Chef. United States Personal Chef Association. Site accessed on 3 December 2010.

Randy Duermyer. Home Business Idea: Personal Chef. About.com. Site accessed on 3 December 2010.