Cooking Class Business Plan, With a First-Year Projection

A cooking school sells an evening: twelve people, a chef, four dishes cooked and eaten together. The groceries for a class cost about $22 a student and the seat sells for $85, so the margin is wide. The plan turns on filling seats: public classes sold online, private parties for birthdays and showers, and corporate team events that book a whole kitchen at a higher price. A teaching kitchen's rent, the chef instructors and the equipment are the fixed costs. In the example, a Kansas City cooking school starts with $172,500, ends its first year about $20,300 ahead before the owner's pay, and makes about $7,200 a month at full speed. Below is each part of the plan, the first year month by month, the startup budget, and a free template.

The short version

• Describe the school in a paragraph: the kitchen, the classes, who comes, the goals.
• Cost each class per student: groceries, wine if served, aprons and supplies, the card fee.
• Plan sales by class type: public classes, private parties, team events and kids' camps.
• Rent and chef instructors decide the month.
• Sell seats ahead; an empty seat is groceries already bought.
• Budget working cash for the slow first months, and check it against the lowest cash point.
• TaroStack keeps each class menu as recipes, so groceries for 12 or 20 are scaled and costed. More below.

Part 1: the business description

Hearth & Table Cooking School, a made-up cooking school in Kansas City, Missouri, writes:

Hearth & Table Cooking School runs a teaching kitchen with 12 cooking stations, offering public evening classes, private parties, corporate team events and summer kids' camps. In its first year it aims to reach $36,600 of sales a month.

Part 2: what a class costs

Groceries are bought for the number booked, so the cost moves with each class's menu. A chef who cooks in clients' homes instead is in personal chef business plan.

Part 3: classes and schedule

Public classes four evenings a week; private parties and team events on weekends and weekday afternoons; a week-long kids' camp each month in summer. A chef instructor and an assistant teach each class of 12.

Part 4: what each product earns

At full speed the business sells $36,600 a month and keeps $26,845, 73.3%; public class seats bring $13,420 of it.

Part 5: the first year, month by month

Fixed costs are $19,600 every month: rent ($5,500), wages for chef instructors and assistants ($11,000), utilities ($900), insurance ($450), equipment and knife upkeep ($300), booking software ($150), ads ($900), and other costs ($400). Sales start at half of full speed:

The year's sales are $348,385, and the business ends it $20,326 ahead, before the owner's pay. It breaks even at about $26,720 of sales a month, in the fifth month. The lowest cash point, −$15,234 in month 4, is covered by the $40,000 of working cash with about $24,800 to spare. Team events seat fewer people at a higher price and fill weekday afternoons the public classes leave empty.

Part 6: the startup budget

The $132,500 before working cash is earned back in about one and a half years at full speed. Running classes in a rented kitchen is in how to start a shared kitchen, and catering from the same kitchen in catering business plan.

Get the template

Download the cooking class business plan workbook. Four sheets: your products, each with its price, variable cost and units a month at full speed; the first year, month by month, with sales ramping up, profit, cash, the first profitable month, the lowest cash point and whether the working cash covers it; your fixed costs; and the startup budget. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.

Where this stops working

The plan uses one grocery cost a student. Every class has its own menu and headcount, and scaling a recipe for 12 or 20 by hand is where the groceries go over.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack keeps each class menu as recipes, so groceries for 12 or 20 are scaled and costed.

Menus as recipes. Each dish is a recipe by weight, scaled to the headcount, with its cost.

Ingredients in their units. Bought by the case, used by the cup, with unit conversion.

Reorder list. Pantry staples come up on a reorder list in days of cover.

Recipes, costing and the reorder list are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.

Questions people also ask

How much does it cost to start a cooking class business?

The example budgets $172,500, including $40,000 of working cash; the teaching kitchen build-out is the biggest item.

Is a cooking class business profitable?

It can be: the example makes about $7,200 a month at full speed before the owner's pay, and ends its first year ahead.

How much do cooking classes cost per student to run?

In the example, about $24 a student for a public class: groceries, wine, supplies and the card fee, before rent and the chef.

How much should I charge for a cooking class?

The example charges $85 for a public evening class, $95 for private parties and $125 for corporate team events.