OAFVC Blog

Food business ownership requires commitment, hard work, and most of all, passion. If you’re considering owning your own food business you probably already have a healthy serving of passion. Here are some pros and cons to help you decide if you should make the leap.

Food tempering isn’t just used for chocolate. In fact, the word "temper" has Latin, French and old English roots, and refers to controlling or moderating temperature. Tempering is therefore relevant to many aspects of cooking. But even in the context of food production, the food tempering process can refer to different things. Here are three types of food tempering processes you should know about.

Business is booming at your established food business, and you’re producing in higher volumes to meet demand — but the storage that was working well before, just isn’t cutting it anymore. Your co-packer has some storage facilities, but scaling up your business with your co-packer is going to be expensive, and you’re wondering what other storage options are on the table.

Starting or growing your small business is exciting, but it’s also stressful and can put you at risk for burnout. Especially as we near the holidays, having some good stress management techniques in place could help you avoid burnout and continue working to build your business. We’ve put together some tips below:

At OAFVC, we’re strong advocates for food safety practices, including hand washing, wearing gloves, and hair nets. Our fruit and vegetable processing room — great for cold pressing, dehydrating, slicing, dicing, and more — requires additional food safety practices. So here’s a run down of some other best practices all food processors should know.

Did you know that a food processing commercial kitchen can help you grow your craft beer business? OAFVC’s commercial kitchen has a product development lab where you can try out new ideas.

New product development is the catalyst for growth in any industry, and the food industry is no different. However, food product development can be a high-risk endeavour. OAFVC offers free business consulting for starting or expanding your food business.

Saving time is important in all areas of your business because saving time often saves money; in this context, a commercial kitchen is one of the most valuable places to increase efficiency. The more product you can process each time you book OAFVC’s commercial kitchen, the more you can potentially sell. Plus, you can book rentals according to your schedule. Try implementing some time-saving cooking tips used by professional chefs, commercial caterers, and household cooks.

So, you’ve got a booth at your local farmers’ market, but your sales haven’t been as high as you’d like. Don’t worry, there are some quick, easy, and super-effective ways to increase your farmers' market sales.

Looking to expand your food processing business? Consider adding a baby food line. Baby food is an easy-to-make product that is in high demand especially if it's organic, healthy, and nutritious. For 2018, the forecast market value of the baby food industry in Canada is 147.5 million dollars.

If you’ve received many compliments on your cooking, but you’re not too keen on opening a restaurant (long hours, evenings and weekends, and a competitive market), there are other ways you can turn your food passion into a food business.

You've heard of the farm-to-table movement, where restaurants serve food using ingredients sourced from local farms. And while sometimes our media can feel oversaturated with food trends, the impact of the farm-to-table movement is mostly positive: boosting local agri-food supply chains and increasing sales for local farmers.