Small Food Entrepreneur

Someone asked me in passing the other day what I was.  It’s always a bit of an odd question because I wonder if I’m supposed to answer with a physical description like “female” or “human.”  But the reality of it is that they wanted to know what I did for a living so I told them I was a small food entrepreneur.  And they looked at me blankly.

While the words Small Food Entrepreneur or Small Food Business may conjur up images of tiny portions and miniscule edibles, in my mind a small food entrepreneur is someone who runs a food business that focuses more of quality over quantity.  The goal of a small food entrepreneur is not to outsource their production to a manufacturing facility and see their product on every grocery store shelf across the nation, but rather to build a brand that uses ‘real’ ingredients and is, at least in parts, handmade.   A small food business may consist of simply the owner making all the product themselves or there may be several employees working together.  A small food business may just be a retail website or a farmers market booth or it could be a bakery that has several locations around the city.   At the end of the day though, the small food entrepreneur is someone who believes that they can build and run a successful food business without preservatives, mass manufacturing techniques, and unpronouncable ingredients.  

Best of all, there seems to be no better time to start a small food business.  The growing focus on quality ingredients and eating local makes it easier for small food businesses to compete with the mega-brands.  While mega-brands can pump out millions upon millions of treat snacks with Chemical Colorant #C53, you bring to the table something they can’t.  Small food businesses provide honest food made with honest ingredients and that’s something more and more people want these days.