Posted by Rad on February 02, 1997 at 16:16:02 :
In Reply to: Re: kitchen space posted by Karen Bruner Upright on October 29, 1996 at 23:29:24 :
: I encountered the same problem a few years ago when I was trying to start a special order pastry business. I found a gourmet foods store willing to let me use the kitchen. The situation was less than perfect (after working the 3-Close shift at my regular job, I made pastries from midnight until four or five in the morning...), and I found the shop employees didn't care about the safety of my equipment and pans, but it could have worked better than it did.
: In Florida it's not legal to work out of your home kitchen. (Well, you can get approved, but it's not easy.) I own a small cafe now and do a lot of catering, so I'm looking for space myself for a catering kitchen. I'm thinking about my garage (it's detached two story in a mixed use area), OR there's a former restaurant site across the street from the cafe that has been vacant for ever. Maybe the landlord will consider splitting the space into office and kitchen and leasing to two separate entities? It's probably worth a shot.
: Try churches - they often have approved kitchens and don't use them during the week.
: Good luck! It's a wild ride.
We were fortunate, we found another caterer, that had quarters too large for his operation and we now share.
He specialized more in the bar end of catering rather than the food. This has worked out reasonably well.
I would suggest going through the yellow pages and randomly asking. We found this by asking some of our
suppliers if they were aware of a place. Many caterers, especially during the slow season, would readily
be happy to entertain the thought of whether it could work out or not.
The person who recommended the churches was right on. This was another area we looked into. This is also
a very real possibility. The only problem I forsee with this is that many times you are dealing with
people on the board of directors that really are set in their ways and are not business oriented at all.
Or that they want your blood for allowing you to do this. Many people are under the opinion that if you
have a sign out front "you are making a killing!"
I also had the experience of running the kitchen of a nightclub in exchange for having full useage of thier
quite large basement prep/kitchen. This just wore me down to much, but you might like to look into it.
Yacht Clubs and Legion Posts or VFW's are always looking for outside income as well.
Best of Luck!