Fresh lemonade has one of the widest margins in food: a cup costs under a dollar in lemons, sugar, ice and the cup, and sells for $6 at a festival. What the plan has to cover is everything around the cup: booth fees at each event, helpers squeezing all day, a trailer and its fuel, and a season that runs spring to fall. Each event needs a temporary food permit, and selling straight to the people drinking it keeps it outside FDA's juice HACCP rule. In the example, a Myrtle Beach lemonade stand starts with $22,500, ends its first year about $48,700 ahead before the owner's pay, and makes about $8,300 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 stand in a paragraph: the events, what you pour, the goals.
- Cost each cup: lemons, sugar, ice, the cup and the card fee.
- Plan sales by product: festival cups, strawberry, field days and party jugs.
- Booth fees and helpers are the fixed costs that decide a month.
- Get a temporary food permit for each event.
- Plan for the season: busy summers, quiet winters.
- TaroStack makes each cup a recipe, so its true cost follows the price of what's in it. More below.
Part 1: the business description
Shoreline Squeeze, a made-up lemonade stand in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, writes:
Shoreline Squeeze is a lemonade stand in a small trailer, squeezing fresh lemonade and strawberry lemonade at festivals and fairs around Myrtle Beach, serving pre-ordered cups at school field days, and selling half-gallon jugs for parties picked up from the stand. In a summer month it aims to reach $18,000 of sales.
Part 2: what a cup costs
| Product | Lemons, sugar, ice | Cup, lid, straw or jug | Card fee | Cost | Price | Cost share |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lemonade, festival cup | $0.48 | $0.27 | $0.18 | $0.93 | $6.00 | 15.5% |
| Strawberry lemonade | $0.85 | $0.27 | $0.21 | $1.33 | $7.00 | 19.0% |
| Field day cup, pre-ordered | $0.48 | $0.27 | $0.75 | $3.50 | 21.4% | |
| Half-gallon jug for a party | $1.55 | $0.60 | $0.48 | $2.63 | $16.00 | 16.4% |
Five gallons make 50 cups, so a batch costs about $24 in lemons, sugar and ice. The booth fee isn't in the cup; it's a fixed cost of the month. Setting the price is in how to price lemonade.
Part 3: events, staffing and permits
Two helpers squeeze and pour while the owner takes payment. Each festival is a separate temporary food permit from the county, in temporary food permit. Field days are pre-ordered by schools and poured on site, and party jugs are picked up from the stand; every cup and jug goes straight to the people drinking it, which keeps the stand a retail business. A café that wanted jugs to resell was turned down for that reason.
Part 4: what each product earns
| Product | Price | Variable cost | Contribution | Margin | Units a month at full speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lemonade, festival cup | $6.00 | $0.93 | $5.07 | 84.5% | 1,800 |
| Strawberry lemonade | $7.00 | $1.33 | $5.67 | 81% | 700 |
| Field day cup, pre-ordered | $3.50 | $0.75 | $2.75 | 78.6% | 400 |
| Half-gallon jug for a party | $16.00 | $2.63 | $13.37 | 83.6% | 60 |
At full speed the business sells $18,060 a month and keeps $14,997.20, 83%; festival cups bring $9,126 of it.
Part 5: the first year, month by month
Fixed costs are $6,700 every month: booth and event fees ($1,700), wages for two helpers ($3,800), trailer fuel and upkeep ($400), commissary kitchen ($300), insurance ($150), ads ($100), software ($50), and other costs ($200). Sales start at 35% of full speed:
| Month | Sales | Profit | Cash, year to date |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $6,321 | −$1,451 | −$1,451 |
| 2 | $7,582 | −$404 | −$1,855 |
| 3 | $8,843 | $643 | −$1,212 |
| 4 | $10,120 | $1,704 | $492 |
| 5 | $11,381 | $2,751 | $3,243 |
| 6 | $12,642 | $3,798 | $7,041 |
| 7 | $13,903 | $4,845 | $11,886 |
| 8 | $15,164 | $5,892 | $17,779 |
| 9 | $16,254 | $6,797 | $24,576 |
| 10 | $17,157 | $7,547 | $32,123 |
| 11 | $18,060 | $8,297 | $40,421 |
| 12 | $18,060 | $8,297 | $48,718 |
The year's sales are $155,487, and the business ends it $48,718 ahead, before the owner's pay. It breaks even at about $8,070 of sales a month, in the third month. The lowest cash point, −$1,855 in month 2, is covered by the $5,000 of working cash with about $3,100 to spare. The plan treats every month alike once sales are built up; lemonade sells most from May to September, so a real year has a quiet winter, and the working cash is there for it.
Part 6: the startup budget
| Item | Example |
|---|---|
| Used concession trailer | $12,000 |
| Commercial lemon press and equipment | $1,500 |
| Ice chests and dispensers | $1,200 |
| Canopy, signs and menu board | $1,000 |
| Generator | $800 |
| Permits and licenses | $600 |
| Opening inventory | $400 |
| Working cash | $5,000 |
| Total to start | $22,500 |
The $17,500 before working cash is earned back in about 2 months at full speed. When a stand needs no permit at all is in can you sell lemonade from home, and the margins in lemonade profit margin.
Get the template
Download the lemonade 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 booth fee and one cup cost. Lemons double in price some weeks, rain cuts a festival day in half, and how many cups a Saturday sold is a guess by Monday.
How TaroStack does it
TaroStack makes each cup a recipe, so its true cost follows the price of lemons and sugar.
Cups as recipes. Each cup is a recipe by weight, so its cost moves when the supplier's price does.
Counts with no signal. The cooler and dry storage can be counted on a phone with no signal, and the reorder list shows what runs out first in days of cover.
Waste with a reason. Lemonade poured out at the end of a festival is recorded as waste with a reason, reported by item.
| The job | Notebook | In TaroStack |
|---|---|---|
| What a cup costs this month | Worked out once | True cost from the recipe |
| What to order before the weekend | A guess | The reorder list |
| What was thrown out | Not recorded | Waste by reason and item |
Recipes, counts 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.