If you want to change your occupation and start a business, choosing what to sell is the first step on your way to success. Out of all options for starting a business, foodstuff seems to be the most promising one.
Food is the one thing that is not subjected to trends – as long as there are people, there will always be a demand for food. Find out how you can found your own business selling foodstuffs in Nigeria!
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1. Food business ideas
There is at least a hundred of business that have something to do with food; some require almost no effort to start, and others are very time-consuming; some business can bring you great revenue from the beginning, and other need time to develop. Check out some of the best food business ideas to consider.
Wholesale
Wholesale foodstuff business in Nigeria is a very promising industry. Here you will need to buy food products directly from manufacturers and factories and sell them to supermarket chains and small individual grocery shops.
Fast food
Restaurant business is best suited for people with at least some experience, but fast food is a great starter business for everyone.
Choose a popular location – a market, a popular rest spot, or a mall – and your specialty. Is it traditional Nigerian food, popular fried food, or some novelty that is not common in your region?
Farming
While farming is a very complex business, some farming areas can be a great place to start your business. Rice farming is probably the best starting point, since rice is the most popular food product in Nigeria. Alternatively, you can get into rice importing business, which is also very profitable.
Read also: small chops business
2. Food stuff business plan
When you start to learn how to start foodstuff business in Nigeria, you quickly find out that the first thing you should do is create a business plan. A business started without a business plan or with a completely unrealistic plan is almost guaranteed to fail. Here are the steps you should take.
- Choose the area of your business: is it one of the industries mentioned above or do you know something better?
- Decide how much money you can put into a business and whether you’ll use your own cash or need a loan from the bank. The amount of money needed largely depends on the type of business: for example, opening a grocery store is much more accessible than starting a rice farm.
- Find the right location, taking into the kind of business you want. People-oriented food businesses work best in busy locations.
- Create a list of everything that needs to be done: e.g. buying the equipment, signing contracts with manufacturers and buyers, renovating the location.
- Hire your workers and train them in case they have no relevant experience. Don’t take this step lightly, because people you work with largely determine the success of your enterprise.
3. How much money do you need?
Anyone who’s wondering how to start food business probably wants to know how much money it takes to open a food-related enterprise. The most affordable way to join the foodstuff industry is to open a fast food stand – it can be done for as little as ₦50,000.
Opening a grocery store is a bit more pricey – depending on the size and the amount of equipment and refrigerators you need, the cost of starting a tiny grocery store can be as high as ₦100,000.
A more advanced shop that not only sells food products but also offers other goods to the customers can cost much more, up to ₦200,000 for a modern store with brand new equipment.
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