Hummus Business Plan: Tubs for Grocers, Markets and Cafés

Hummus is chickpeas, tahini, lemon, garlic and oil, and a 10-ounce tub costs about $1.31 with its tub and label, sold to a grocer for $3.75. Tahini is the dearest ingredient, more than the chickpeas. The plan turns on two things. Hummus without preservatives keeps days, not months, so deliveries run twice a week and every tub carries a use-by date. And selling to grocers means a food license, FDA registration as a food facility, and for a business under $1 million a year, the qualified facility attestation. Restaurants and cafés buy it in 5-pound tubs, and catering trays fill the weekends. The plan below works per tub. In the example, a Dearborn hummus maker starts with $50,700, ends its first year about $4,800 ahead before the owner's pay, and makes about $4,300 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 flavors, who buys, where you make it, the goals.
• Cost each tub: chickpeas and tahini by weight, the tub, lid and label, the card fee.
• Plan sales by product: grocer tubs, market tubs, restaurant tubs, catering trays.
• Fresh hummus keeps days: plan deliveries twice a week and date every tub.
• Selling wholesale: a food license, FDA registration and the qualified facility attestation.
• Tahini costs more than the chickpeas; watch its price.
• TaroStack makes each hummus a recipe and each batch a lot with its date. More below.

Part 1: the business description

Cedar and Lemon Hummus, a made-up hummus maker in Dearborn, Michigan, writes:

Cedar and Lemon Hummus makes classic, roasted red pepper and spicy hummus in a shared commercial kitchen and sells 10-ounce tubs to eight independent grocers and at two farmers markets, 5-pound tubs to restaurants and cafés, and catering trays with pita. In its first year it aims to reach $19,870 of sales a month.

Part 2: what a tub costs

A 10-ounce tub uses 2 ounces of dried chickpeas, cooked, and an ounce and a half of tahini at $6 a pound: 56 cents of tahini against 15 cents of chickpeas. Grocers sell the tub for about $5.99. Catering trays, for 25 with pita and vegetables, sell for $65 and cost $14. How long hummus keeps, and how a 10-day date was set, is in hummus shelf life.

Part 3: customers, the date and the rules

Tubs are dated 10 days from making, and grocers want at least a week left, so the kitchen makes on Mondays and Thursdays and delivers the next morning. Selling to grocers takes a food processing license from the state, and the business registers with FDA as a food facility. With sales well under $1 million a year, it's a qualified facility and files the attestation every two years instead of a full food safety plan, in qualified facility attestation. Tahini is sesame, a major allergen, and goes on every label's Contains line.

Part 4: what each product earns

At full speed the business sells $19,870 a month and keeps $13,730.40, 69.1%; grocer tubs bring $7,320 of it.

Part 5: the first year, month by month

Fixed costs are $9,450 every month: shared kitchen hours ($1,800), wages for a cook and a driver ($5,500), refrigerated van fuel and upkeep ($500), cold storage ($300), market fees ($300), insurance ($300), store demos ($400), software ($50), and other costs ($300). Sales start at 35% of full speed:

The year's sales are $171,062, and the business ends it $4,805 ahead, before the owner's pay. It breaks even at about $13,680 of sales a month, in the sixth month. The lowest cash point, −$13,611 in month 5, is covered by the $14,000 of working cash with about $400 to spare. Grocers add a maker one store at a time, so the plan's ramp is mostly new stores; a demo day in each new store helps the first orders.

Part 6: the startup budget

The $36,700 before working cash is earned back in about 9 months at full speed. Another refrigerated dip is in salsa business plan, and what grocers ask of a new supplier in selling to grocery stores requirements.

Get the template

Download the hummus 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

Ten-day hummus moves fast. Two batches a week, three flavors, eight grocers and two markets, and a case from Monday's batch sits behind Thursday's until it's past its date.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack makes each hummus a recipe and each batch a batch with its lot and date, so the oldest goes out first.

Recipes by weight. Each hummus is a recipe by weight, so its cost moves with what goes into it.

Each batch a batch. A batch is a batch with its date, lot and use-by date, and how many units it made. Which tahini lot went into it is on record.

First-expired-first-out. Orders take the oldest units first by default, and a grocer can be set to take only units with enough days left.

Recipes, batches, lots and first-expired-first-out 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 hummus business?

The example budgets $50,700, including $14,000 of working cash; the used refrigerated van is the biggest item.

Is a hummus business profitable?

It can be: the example makes about $4,300 a month at full speed before the owner's pay, and ends its first year ahead.

How much does a tub of hummus cost to make?

In the example, about $1.31 for 10 ounces: 91 cents of ingredients, most of it tahini, and 40 cents for the tub, lid and label.

Do I need a license to sell hummus?

Yes: hummus needs refrigeration, so it's made in a licensed kitchen, and selling to grocers brings FDA registration as a food facility.