Need advice on how to sell bakery products

My wife is an excellent baker.Since being diagnosed with Celiac she has had to adjust all of her products to be gluten free. After much trial and error, she has it down pat. Her stuff is so good, that a local bakery wants to start carrying her speciality products due to many of their customers asking for it.

The bakery has presented 3 options to us:

1. They purchase the product from my wife wholesale, and sell it at their shop.

2. The bakery will carry her line of goods advertised as hers, and she will pay the bakery for the use of the space

3. She can be employed by the shop to come in and do the baking.


My wife eventually wants to do this on her own, so option #3 is not attractive for a number of reasons. We are weighing options 1 and 2 and I was hoping to get feedback on what you all think would be the better option.

Thanks in advance!

Just some off-top-of-my-head thoughts: Does your wife have a commercial kitchen? If not, how would you do option #1? If you use option number 2, will the bakery allow your wife to sell her products to whatever other distributor may want to carry her product? With option 2, will the bakery have access to your wife's recipes, which would then allow them to produce her products without her?

1. Option 1 is doable as the line of products would be small, 5 or 6 and also by special order.

2 She would be allowed to sell to others

3 No access to recipes.

Thanks!

quote:

Originally posted by renfrew

1. Option 1 is doable as the line of products would be small, 5 or 6 and also by special order.

Even if it's just one product, she'll still need a commercial kitchen, if she's gonna be legal. While many people make products in their home kitchen, it's not legal to do so. I can't believe that a business would knowingly buy products that were made in a home kitchen.

This addresses that very situation:
http://en.allexperts.com/q/Food-Safety-Issues-767/Baking-home-resale.htm

Patent the recipe and contract with the bakery to produce and sell your product. They pay for and do everything. You make a percentage on each piece that's sold, without having to work. As the business grows, you may consider expanding distribution. Worked for Mrs. Fields and Famous Amos. Start small, think global.

CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs

quote:

Originally posted by chicagostyledog

Patent the recipe and contract with the bakery to produce and sell your product. They pay for and do everything. You make a percentage on each piece that's sold, without having to work. As the business grows, you may consider expanding distribution. Worked for Mrs. Fields and Famous Amos. Start small, think global.

I agree 100%. This reduces the risk to virtually zero, while providing a good potential for profit.

Since when can you patent a recipe?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060725133604AADPvAN

As to the reply of patenting a recipe. RJF

quote:

Originally posted by chicagostyledog

Patent the recipe and contract with the bakery to produce and sell your product. CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs

I'm not sure you can effectively patent a recipe. That's why most places just try to keep them secret. The problem is even if you wereable to patent your list of ingredients, I could still come along and change just one measurement by an inconsequential amount, and it would no longer be your protected recipe.

If I remember right, Famous Amos got his original cookie recipe right off a package of chocolate chips. It was his marketing skills that made him famous.

quote:

Originally posted by SimonD

quote:

Originally posted by chicagostyledog

Patent the recipe and contract with the bakery to produce and sell your product. CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs

I'm not sure you can effectively patent a recipe. That's why most places just try to keep them secret. The problem is even if you were able to patent your list of ingredients, I could still come along and change just one measurement by an inconsequential amount, and it would no longer be your protected recipe.

If I remember right, Famous Amos got his original cookie recipe right off a package of chocolate chips. It was his marketing skills that made him famous.

A recipe is merely a process. If the process is new, innovative, and unobvious, it's absolutely patentable as a subject matter.

CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs

Since no one who has commented so far is a patent attorny, I don't think; I suggest she and you sit down with not just one, but several of them (Patent Attys from DIFFERENT firms) and see what's real or not. I agree with CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs, on his recommendation if it is bulletproof and doable. Why work if you can just sit back and clip coupons! And then hook up with one of the big bakery companies. You'll be in Diamonds as big as Horse Turds before you know it!

quote:

Originally posted by SimonD

quote:

Originally posted by chicagostyledog

Patent the recipe and contract with the bakery to produce and sell your product. CSD PhD-Professor of Hot Dogs

I'm not sure you can effectively patent a recipe. That's why most places just try to keep them secret. The problem is even if you wereable to patent your list of ingredients, I could still come along and change just one measurement by an inconsequential amount, and it would no longer be your protected recipe.

If I remember right, Famous Amos got his original cookie recipe right off a package of chocolate chips. It was his marketing skills that made him famous.

Some good ol' boy in a white suit and a string tie from KY did it with a Chicken Recipe. I'm not sure but I think he was able to pull it off!

quote:

Originally posted by Foodbme
Some good ol' boy in a white suit and a string tie from KY did it with a Chicken Recipe. I'm not sure but I think he was able to pull it off!

If he had a patent, is was likely on his unique pressure frying method, not the actual recipe. Those 11 herbs and spices are still secret. If they were listed in the patent, that would be a matter of public record.

Thanks for the replies all...

Just to clarify, she would be baking in a commercial kitchen, i misunderstood the questions.

As for patents and selling recipes and making gazillions while sitting back and clipping coupons....its a nce idea, but my lady loves to bake and wants to bake. She does not want others baking her stuff, at least not yet. She does not want to sit back.

quote:

Originally posted by renfrew

Thanks for the replies all...

Just to clarify, she would be baking in a commercial kitchen, i misunderstood the questions.

As for patents and selling recipes and making gazillions while sitting back and clipping coupons....its a nce idea, but my lady loves to bake and wants to bake. She does not want others baking her stuff, at least not yet. She does not want to sit back.

OK, let her bake and YOU sit back and count the coin!

quote:

Originally posted by renfrew

As for patents and selling recipes and making gazillions while sitting back and clipping coupons....its a nce idea, but my lady loves to bake and wants to bake. She does not want others baking her stuff, at least not yet. She does not want to sit back.

I predict that will change when things take off with product orders. There's nothing that changes one's outlook about an enjoyable task as effectively as turning that enjoyable task into a job.