Granola Bar Business Plan: Bars for Markets, Cafés and Gyms

A granola bar is oats, nuts and honey pressed into a pan, cut and wrapped: about 65 cents of ingredients for a 2-ounce bar. Pressing, cutting and wrapping are the time; the wrapper is the packaging. Cafés and gyms buy at about $2 a bar, and a corporate snack account at less, for volume. The plan turns on a bar press or cutter, a wrapper sealer, shared kitchen hours, and a label with a Nutrition Facts panel for the bars that go to stores. In the example, a Utah granola maker starts with $13,500, ends its first year about $19,300 ahead before the owner's pay, and makes about $2,800 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 business in a paragraph: the bars, who buys, the goals.
• Cost each bar: oats, nuts and honey, the wrapper, the time, the card fee.
• Plan sales by product: direct bars, café and gym bars, shipped boxes, a corporate account.
• Wholesale is the volume: press and cut in big pans.
• Bars sold through stores often need a Nutrition Facts panel.
• A cutter and a sealer keep the time down.
• TaroStack makes each bar a recipe and each batch a lot. More below.

Part 1: the business description

Cache Valley Granola Co., a made-up granola maker in Logan, Utah, writes:

Cache Valley Granola Co. adds granola bars to its granola, pressed in a shared kitchen in Logan: single bars at the market and a café counter, wholesale to cafés and gyms, boxes of 12 shipped, and a corporate snack account for an office park. In its first year it aims to reach $9,500 of bar sales a month.

Part 2: what a bar costs

The shipped box's packaging includes the mailer; the customer pays shipping. Granola by the bag is in granola business plan.

Part 3: customers, the kitchen and the label

Bars are pressed in full sheet pans, set overnight, cut with a guillotine cutter and wrapped on a sealer, three bake days a week. Bars sold through cafés, gyms and the corporate account carry a full label with a Nutrition Facts panel; the small business exemption can cover some makers, in nutrition label small business exemption.

Part 4: what each product earns

At full speed the business sells $9,500 a month and keeps $4,374, 46%; café and gym bars bring $1,660 of it.

Part 5: the first year, month by month

Fixed costs are $1,530 every month: shared kitchen hours ($1,000), insurance ($150), market fees ($120), storage shelf ($60), software ($50), and other costs ($150). Sales start at 35% of full speed:

The year's sales are $81,885, and the business ends it $19,347 ahead, before the owner's pay. It breaks even at about $3,320 of sales a month, in the first month. The lowest cash point, $10 in month 1, never goes below zero. Wholesale accounts build over the year; the corporate account brings volume at a thin margin, which the café and gym bars make up.

Part 6: the startup budget

The $8,500 before working cash is earned back in about 3 months at full speed. Pricing a bar from its batch is in how to price granola, and protein bars in protein bar business plan.

Get the template

Download the granola bar 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 honey and nut price. Almonds that jump in price, a batch that crumbles when cut, and a gym that cancels change the month.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack makes each bar a recipe and each batch a lot, so its true cost follows the price of oats, nuts and honey.

Recipes by weight. Each bar is a recipe by weight, with oats, nuts and honey bought by the case or sack and used by the gram.

Each batch a lot. Each batch records the ingredient lots it used, gets its own lot and date, and counts what came out good.

Orders and the oldest first. Shop and market orders are sales orders, and the oldest lots go out first by default.

Recipes, batches, lots and orders 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 granola bar business?

The example budgets $13,500, including $5,000 of working cash; the bar press and cutter is the biggest item.

Is a granola bar business profitable?

It can be: the example makes about $2,800 a month at full speed before the owner's pay, and ends its first year ahead.

How much does a granola bar cost to make?

In the example, about $1.17 before the card fee: 65 cents of oats, nuts and honey, a 12-cent wrapper, and 40 cents of pressing, cutting and wrapping.

Do granola bars need a nutrition label?

Bars sold through stores often do; the small business exemption covers some makers who make no nutrition claims.