Personally, not only would i NEVER
do this, i'm shocked
that you would publicly tell people you do this and especially on a bbq forum
. My opinion is that this type of vending might make you some quick cash, but isn't going to help you gain a loyal customer following which is what you need to build up, if you're going to have a long term business.
I'm not saying I'm right, I'm just saying what works for me. Please don't diss me for the choices I've made, they may not be the same ones that you would make and that's fine but for anyone thinking / wanting to start up their own BBQ business than I hope that my story is helpful:-
I started out cooking my own pork / beef etc in my kitchen at home and it became clear very early on that I needed commercial premises. (Of course every kitchen is different)
A year later I reached the stage of smokers and ovens working 24 hours and our sausage stuffer was churning out 50 kg a shift. We were not only making for our own consumption but selling to other catering businesses too.
I learned a lot about how to do things on a large(ish) scale. I wanted at the start to do everything "without compromise" from a purists perspective, we even made black pudding using fresh pigs blood - after all we're a Lancashire business
Despite everyone around me telling me "wait and see, when you get past small scale that compromise is inevitable I still wanted to do it differently and better but sure enough they were right...at least to some extent.
I had to make some compromises, that said, one thing that I was not prepared to do was add artificial additives to any of my produce however and I still don't.
When I got to the stage that my commercial production was bigger than my catering production my EHO guys advised me to start looking at SALSA or BRC accreditation and they were very helpful in putting me in touch with other business that had gone down this route.
With EHO help I decided that this wasn't the way to take my business or my life. Work life balance was the reason I started out doing BBQ and things were starting to go wrong.
I chose to work with a cooked meats manufacturer to produce pulled meats to my specification and not only do we still supply fresh and without additives, with their help I've improved the packaging and shelf life.
My sausage is made for me exactly to my specification, again without additives, without bulking agents and emulsifiers.
The long and short of what I'm trying to say is that if you have the right controls in place there's no difference between pulling your own pork, having and employee do it or outsourcing it altogether. As a business gets bigger, there are compromises that have to be made but it's your decision which compromises are worthwhile and which are tabu.
If you want to set up as a catering business without compromise then I applaud you and wish you every success. Your business may however rely of your customer base appreciating your "no compromise" approach and being willing to pay more (or you being willing to make less). If this is your approach then I wouldn't do event vending unless I was doing it in part to advertise my business.
Someone earlier in this thread touched on pitch fees and this is an absolute killer for any business because your focus on the day of the event has to be about covering the pitch fee and that is driven by how attractive your stand is and quickly can you serve and take the money. This is one reason why I've outsourced the manufacture of my pulled meats.
I run a successful BBQ business, we cater, we make BBQ grills & smokers and we make pulled meats. I know what I'm talking about because I speak from experience and as I wrote in my last post I'm more than happy to share but by no means do I believe that my way is the righteous way or only way. We are all different, we all have different values and thus will all make different decisions / compromises and it's that diversity that gives customers a choice.
That's it, nuff said, sorry for the epistle.
