Lumpia Business Plan, With a Projection

A lumpia business plan is a plan for rolling. A vegetable lumpia has about 14 cents of wrapper and filling in it and takes about 20 seconds to roll, so a fried plate of six costs $3.41 to make and serve and sells for $10 at a market. The frozen bags are what keep the rolling going between markets: they sell to people who ate a plate on Saturday and to Asian grocers all week. In the example below, a lumpia maker in Phoenix sells fried plates and turon at markets and frozen bags direct and to grocers, and ends its first year about $26,500 ahead on $78,600 of sales, with every hour paid at $20. Below is a description example, each part of the plan, the meat rules, the first year month by month, the startup budget, and a free template.

The short version

• Describe the business in a paragraph: the lumpia, where it sells, the goals.
• Cost a roll from the wrapper up: wrapper, filling, the seconds it takes to roll.
• Fried plates at markets earn the most, and sell the frozen bags.
• Frozen bags to grocers sell the most rolls for the least each.
• Pork lumpia brings in the meat inspection rules for anything sold wholesale; vegetable and banana don't.
• Date every frozen batch and sell the oldest first.
• TaroStack makes each batch from the wrapper and filling recipes, dates every bag, and costs it. More below.

Part 1: the business description

Camelback Lumpia Co., a made-up lumpia maker in Phoenix, Arizona, I use in these examples, writes:

Camelback Lumpia Co. hand-rolls vegetable lumpia and banana turon in a shared commercial kitchen, fries them to order at three Phoenix markets, and sells frozen bags of vegetable lumpia at the stall, online for local pickup, and to Asian grocers across the valley. In its first year it aims to roll 11,000 lumpia a month.

Part 2: what each sale costs

A frozen bag of 20 is mostly wrappers, filling and rolling time, $5.02 of its $6.16. The rolling is the part that scales with hands, not equipment: a family rolling together is faster than one person, but every pair of hands is paid.

Part 3: customers and prices

In a month at full speed the fried plates bring $2,636 of the $6,952 of contribution, the direct frozen bags $1,776, the turon $1,302 and the grocers $1,238. The grocers take the most rolls, 5,000 a month, and bring the least for each; they keep the kitchen rolling on weekdays. What a market stall costs is in cost to sell at a farmers market, and what grocery buyers ask of a new supplier in selling to grocery stores requirements.

Part 4: the meat rules

Lumpia shanghai, the pork kind, is a meat product. Meat products sold to grocers or restaurants come under federal or state meat inspection, and the retail exemption that lets a shop make them for its own customers has limits; how it works is in sausage making business plan. This plan sells vegetable lumpia and turon frozen, and keeps pork for the plates fried at its own stall, under its county's food permit. Check your state and county before planning on frozen pork lumpia.

Part 5: the first year, month by month

Fixed costs are $1,735 every month: the shared commercial kitchen ($900), market fees ($400), the mobile food permit and licenses averaged ($60), insurance ($90), rented freezer space ($100), ads ($150), and software and card fees ($35). Sales start at 15% of full speed:

The year's sales are $78,569 and the profit $26,467, with every hour paid at $20. A full month is about 11,300 rolls, around 65 hours of rolling and 30 at the stall.

Part 6: the startup budget

The $5,200 spent before working cash is earned back in month 8, when the cash reaches $7,686.

Get the template

Download the lumpia business plan workbook. Four sheets: your plates, bags and turon with price, variable cost and a month at full speed; the first year, month by month, with sales, profit and cash; your fixed costs; and your startup budget with working cash. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.

Where this stops working

Wrappers bought by the case, cabbage, carrots and bean sprouts bought fresh twice a week, frozen bags rolled on different days in two freezers, three markets a week and grocers reordering. A notebook can't say which bags in the freezer are oldest, or whether there are enough wrappers for Friday's roll. Which bags go first is in FEFO vs FIFO.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack makes each batch from the wrapper and filling recipes, dates every bag, and costs it.

Recipes inside recipes. A bag of vegetable lumpia is a recipe made from a filling sub-recipe and wrappers, so each roll takes them off stock and is costed from what they cost, with the labor minutes recorded, and "what could I make right now" says how many bags the wrappers and filling on hand allow.

Every bag dated. Each batch gets a lot and a best-by date, recorded automatically, and picking lists put the earliest dates first.

Grocers' orders. Each grocer's order is a sales order, and the lots each grocer got are recorded as it ships.

Recipes, sub-recipes, lots and sales 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

Is a lumpia business profitable?

It can be. In the example, a lumpia maker ends its first year about $26,500 ahead on $78,600 of sales, with every hour paid at $20 and the market plates bringing the most.

How much does it cost to make lumpia?

In the example, about 14 cents of wrapper and vegetable filling a roll and 20 seconds of rolling, about 25 cents a roll before the bag, oil and fees.

Can you sell frozen lumpia to grocery stores?

Yes, made in a licensed kitchen and labeled for retail. Vegetable lumpia is an ordinary packaged food; pork lumpia brings in the meat inspection rules.

How much does it cost to start a lumpia business?

In the example, $8,700, with the fryer and market setup, the freezer and $3,500 of working cash the biggest parts.