Something's Cooking In The Kitchen

Ireland is rightly known for its superb artisan food products but for many budding entrepreneurs wanting to set up a small food business & develop a new product or range, kitting out a commercial kitchen is simply too big an outlay.

Kicking the mammy out of her kitchen and taking over the family cooker and worktops while the poor children starve is apparently not an option either! So what's a budding food business owner to do?

Ready Steady Cook

Our Kickstart Your Business feature Kitchen Incubators Kerry set up to give food producers somewhere to develop new food products. When Eileen and Ray McClure decided to kickstart their own food business, they were unable to rent a commercial kitchen. They knew from their previous life in Chicago that an incubation kitchen for hire would solve their difficulty, and decided to bridge that gap in the market first.

Kitchen Incubators Kerry gives food businesses the opportunity to rent a commercial kitchen for a few hours, for a day or even seven days a week. This allows the budding entrepreneur flexibility as their business grows and the mammy can breathe a sigh of relief that her kitchen is safe once more.

Hot From The Oven

Whilst Gerard and George admired Eileen's can-do attitude in bridging that gap, they suggested that she is undervaluing her offer, and missing out on the premium available to her for the added value she brings to the incubator kitchen: the knowledge and experience she has gained in getting a new food business researched, developed and to market. In other words, she's charging too little!

Over To You

What other ingredients can Eileen introduce into the mix to help her grow her business and grow the value in her offering? Listen back to the show on Kickstart Your Business and let us know what you think.

We'd love to hear from you.

Kickstart Your Business is broadcast live on The Right Hook on Newstalk106 in Ireland every Thursday at 6.20pm and is available on Playback immediately afterwards.