Startup Roaster Selling at Farmers Markets

[CoffeeJunky]

We are doing the same thing this year, but the market is a Friday evening event, with a car show and other entertainment. We have a purpose built propane roaster based on a large BBQ grill. have not decided whether to take it along and roast for show or not. Will need some extra people to make that work, as you can't roast, brew pour and sell at the same time. We use kraft paper bags with tin ties, and date each bag. After a week I get rid of the coffee. We plan to donate the old coffee this year. We operate under the cottage food laws in our state, which allow us to do a certain volume of sales producing at home and charging no sales tax. Last year I did 600 lbs. I plan to double that this year. No way to make a living without pouring some cups, I would say. But fun!

Fun is one of the factor i was thinking about doing it myself but i do not like spending hours roasting.
Yes if you are planning on roasting at teh farmers market, you would need another person or two to help you do other things.
I would actually have helper roast the beans since you will be the best marketing person for your own company.

 

[Kbeans]

I think farmers market is great place to start.

I know few people actually roasted their beans at the market.
YOu will just need to purchase propane roaster to do that.
I always thought having your own roaster at the farmers market will give you edge over others.
Most of the people do know notice fresh coffee verses stale coffee that was sitting on the shelves for months.
But if they can see you are roasting their beans as they are being ordered, they will know they are fresh roasted.
But you have remember, you won't make killing selling beans. So you should sell cups cold or hot brew what ever the demand is.

350 pounds sounds like a lot of beans but at 7-8 dollars profit per pound, you only made about 3000 gross profit and after the expenses, you would be lucky to break even.
So Yes, you have to sell cups. Cold or Hot brew. If you can manage espresso base drinks, do that as well.
If you start on right foot, you will have fun doing this and make decent profit.

What do you think about just starting off the first market year with one full bag of a really good single origin coffee and roasting it at 2 or 3 different roast levels? If my sales look promising I can order another bag or 2 of another kind. I am only using a Huky 500 which does 1 pound at a time, so I don't want to buy to much coffee at once and have it get old.

 

[Kbeans]

I agree with this. We started off at a decent size farmers market with around 2500 people coming through during the day. Our average sales were around $250 for 5 hours. We also served hot and iced coffee in our second year. I kept track of expenses and when you factored in the cost of the market space, cups, water, cream, ice, sugar and our time, the market was not really a profitable venture. We did not participate in the market last year and our expense were down dramatically with our total sales going up. Do your homework and keep track of your total cost and profit for the market.

What do you charge for cups of coffee, hot and cold?

 

[CoffeeJunky]

What do you think about just starting off the first market year with one full bag of a really good single origin coffee and roasting it at 2 or 3 different roast levels? If my sales look promising I can order another bag or 2 of another kind. I am only using a Huky 500 which does 1 pound at a time, so I don't want to buy to much coffee at once and have it get old.

Did you already purchase Huky500?

 

[Kbeans]

Did you already purchase Huky500?

I have not purchased the Huky 500 yet.

 

[Bardo]

We roast only one bean at a time and do two or sometimes three roast levels. For our volume, it keeps things simpler. We are looking at buying a second bean this Spring, but the complexity that is added to the production and packaging is a bit daunting right now.

 

[7over]

We started selling at a great little farmers market about 5 years ago that also has about 2,500 people flow through it in a 6 hour period. We sell hot coffee by the cup, cold brew coffee on ice and pounds coffee beans we roasted the day before. We typically sell 30 to 60 gallons of coffee (hot and cold combined) and between 40 and 60 lbs of coffee beans each Saturday at that market. Our biggest day we sold 104 pounds of coffee beans at $15 per pound.
We bring 5 varieties of beans (including a decaf), offer free samples of all brewed coffees and have a grinder so we can grind coffee for the customers that don't own a grinder. Revenue from the market for us is between $1,800 and $2,400 each week. ($1,800 during the early and late weeks of the market, peak of summer it's in the $2,000+ range)
As a startup roaster, it was the single best thing we ever did. Being at the market got us much better known in the community and in the beginning, it tripled our business. Now that we've grown substantially, the market is still a good business for us but it represents a fraction of our overall revenue.

If you can get to a farmer's market in an upscale town and do it well, you can earn a lot of money.

 

[Kbeans]

Wow that sounds like a good sized farmers market 7over! I'm not sure how many people come thru our farmers markets here. Thank tou very much for sharing your success and experiences with me. I am excited to start selling at a farmers market!