How to Start Your Own Food Company

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

With the global food and beverage market projected to reach €12 trillion in 2030, now is a great time to start your own food business. This guide will walk you through every step of how to start a food brand, from ideation to launch and beyond. We’ll cover market research, legal requirements, product development, branding, funding, marketing strategies, and more to help you succeed.

Step 1: Validate Your Idea

A successful food business depends on the popularity of your idea among your customers. While a ketchup ice cream is unlikely to attract a crowd big enough to earn money from it, a spicy tomato sauce for meat lovers sounds like a much better idea.

But before you invest your savings into building the product, you really want to test whether it has potential for success.

Ask and answer yourself the following questions:

  • Has my idea ever been done before anywhere else? Where? Did it succeed? Why/why not?
  • Who would your potential customers be?
  • Why would they buy my product?

Based on the answer, make a small prototype of your idea and distribute it to friends, family, and acquaintances to get their feedback.

Step 2: Create a Solid Business Plan

A well-structured business plan should include:

  • Executive Summary: Overview of your food brand and goals.
  • Market Analysis: Insights from your research, including target audience (e.g., Gen Z for trendy snacks).
  • Product Description: Details on what you’re offering.
  • Operations Plan: How you’ll produce and distribute.
  • Financial Projections: Startup costs, revenue forecasts, and break-even analysis.
  • Marketing Strategy: High-level overview (detailed later).

Every country in the world regulates its food business category for hygiene and public health purposes. Ensure that you respect the local guidelines by obtaining the certification needed to operate legally.

Here are a few key points to keep in mind:

  • Obtain the authorisation from your regulatory food hygiene agency.
  • Think of a conservation date for your product.
  • Ensure your packaging meets legal requirements.
  • If going through distributors, reserve a barcode.
  • Ensure your label meets legal requirements (write the ingredients, the nutritional values, etc)
  • Obtain any other relevant certification (organic, etc)

Step 4: Develop Your Product

Turn your idea into a tangible product. No need to spend thousands hiring food production companies, start by making batches of your product in your kitchen. Alibaba can help you acquire semi-professional equipment for a fair cost, helping you scale locally with minimal expenditures.

Step 5: Build Your Brand Identity

Your brand is what sets you apart. Create a compelling story and pair it up with a high-quality design. The food industry is among the most competitive in terms of offering. Supermarkets can offer up to 140,000 items on their shelves. Ensure your product sticks out.

Use AI services like Packify to browse ideas and hire a designer on Fiverr to create the design.

Step 6: Get Your First Customers

The food market is so big that it offers you several choices when it comes to sales.

Generally, you can either sell directly to your customers online or by setting up your own shop at a farmers’ or Christmas market.

If you’d rather aim for scale, you can look for distributors who will sell your product for you. Start by visiting small independent supermarkets and take some samples with you for them to taste.

Step 7: Set Up Manufacturing and Supply Chain

Do you have some sales coming in? Great! You’ve proven that there is a market for your product.

It’s now time to scale your activity.

Make an ROI analysis to decide whether it is worth investing in your own infrastructure to scale up production, or look for external contractors that can take care of producing your product for you.

Ensure that you keep production localized to avoid supply chain disruption.

Step 8: Develop Marketing and Sales Strategies

There’s only one metric that will decide whether your business is successful or not: sales.

Effective marketing drives visibility, which drives sales and ensures your business can make enough money to thrive. Today, this means:

  • Being Present on Social Media: Get active on platforms like Instagram and TikTok for visuals and trends.
  • Influencer Partnerships: Collaborate for authentic promotion.
  • User-Generated Content: Encourage shares for organic growth.
  • Digital Tactics: SEO, PPC, and content marketing.

Step 9: Scale and Grow

Post-launch, focus on growth. Analyze data to refine products and expand distribution. Build customer loyalty through newsletters and rewards. Explore new markets or product lines.

Conclusion

Launching your own food brand requires dedication, but with careful planning and execution, it can be rewarding. From validating your idea to mastering marketing, each step builds toward success. Remember, all of the biggest food companies in the world started small. Stay adaptable, prioritize quality, and engage your audience.

Looking For a Food Co-Packer?

Most food co-packing companies work with big established brands and require MOQs in the thousands. We built Doypacked.eu to help small food entrepreneurs launch their product quickly and iterate until they find product-market fit.

  • Looking for doypack, gusset bags, or tin cans co-packing?
  • In need of dry powder mixing?
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Contact us today.