I am a terrible cook
Well, technically, I’m not terrible… A more apt description would be not a cook. I just usually get home and want to do other things.
Pretty much the same thing happens to me during lunch.
I’d just rather go eat somewhere. Their food is usually better than mine.
And trust me, I’ve tried this out before… the whole “making” meals thing. It didn’t go so well. I once tried to make spaghetti and ended up with a small palm-full of noodles…. it was not, shall we say, divinely inspired.
Yes, yes. I suck at cooking!
Stop laughing.
Maybe I just have bad depth perception, you don’t know.
Anyway, here’s what I’d love…
I want a service that lets me pick out meals every week and delivers them to me in an easy to reheat sort of way.
Oh, and the food needs to be decent, and it needs to be cheaper than getting delivery/pickup every night.
That doesn’t seem like too tall an order, does it?
I chose the nice round number of 11 for number of meals.Why?? Mainly because 43 was taken, 21 seems a little overkill, 37 seems too drab, 7 seems too few, and 14 doesn’t let me eat my leftovers.
This shouldn’t be too hard a business. Here’s why I think it’s a good investment (for you. Don’t ask me for money).
- People are increasingly working late hours (prior to 1980, no one ever worked overtime… in France). I have no data to support this. Just trust me.
- People are increasingly dating other working people (or married…. PS, only do this if your wife promises to be a doctor
). No, the world is not becoming filled with man on man living situations (ok, it might be). Irregardless, there are lots of couples where both people work.Why are they all working then??Because shit keeps getting more expensive. And with Amazon only a few clicks away, prices really rack up quick. So you need to have more money coming in. I think there was something else about equal opportunity and something and something leading to something, but it’s mainly about money. And satisfaction. - With 2 people coming home tired to a house, they are bound to get food from someone else’s labor. You’ve heard the word outsourcing. This is what they’re talking about.Someone else can do it cheaper and better than you…. (there are several delivery jokes I could go with here, but Richesh will get pissed. So I’ll stop. ) The status quo is to order in or go get pick up (at least in my house).But!!, people still want to save their money. Thus, combine eating in, with cheaper delivery. And spice that shit up with some homecooking.
Options
Here are some options to spruce up the joint with some web 2.0 trucks through the internets to deliver the feeds:
- Create a website to let your customers create their week of meals. Let people vote on meals they like. The chicken alfredo is terrible? Drop it or make it better. Restaurants can’t even get this stuff done. You will be a leg up on them.
- Make a community out of it. People will love you for it. And these are simple to build. Maybe people will even start eating together and you’ll change the world. (Please note sarcasm started a few sentences ago… unless this actually happens… in which case, I was deadly serious.)
- Add new meals as some of the bad ones get filtered out. This is where RSS comes in. You’ve never even heard of RSS? It’s basically a glorified subscription that comes to you in realtime over the internet. New meals, sign me up. Emails are very passe — never send these.
- Create shirts. This is good for advertising. People wear shirts.
- Print google ads on your meal boxes. This is a good option to help make your meals free. You cannot launch a web based company without google ads, so don’t take this step lightly.
Where do I start?
I would start small, [update for Brent] but I don’t have a business plan here, just an idea.
- Find a friend that knows Ruby on Rails and give him a year of food for building your site. After a year, have him rebuild it in Java (unless he is really smart and can make Rails go fast).
- Find a friend of a friend (a regular friend will also do) who is a cook. Hire them. Work the thing initially on weekends. A good Mom cook might also do here.
- Use your car to deliver the service to your friends. These people will be known as your “angel investors.” Don’t let them get a head about it.
Ok. Enough free unbelievalosities for today. Hope you enjoyed.
Now bring me some meals of food!
Blake
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August 21st, 2007 at 1:57 pm
Have you ever considered takeout? I can get a pretty decent thai, italian or middle eastern (etc) meal togo for $10/person.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:05 pm
What you suggest above is perfectly doable but the price point will be higher than takeout. Because I need better labor and I’m paying higher per unit food costs in this business. I also don’t have the benefit of batch processes like bulk chopping vegetables.
There are chef’s that offer this service in Chicago currently but its pricey.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:22 pm
Does my situation change if I cook and deliver one day a week? Get a chef looking to make some extra money one day a week (maybe a slow Tuesday), and then deliver on Wednesday? Food doesn’t need to be hot, but I only want to pay about 50-60 bucks a head per week.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:26 pm
So you want someone to cook 11 diverse meals for two people in one evening and to do it for $120 total?
McDonald’s $5 value meals would run you $110, maybe you should check those out.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:27 pm
Man, quit aiming so high. The idea would be to have more than 2 customers, so you can benefit from a little volume.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:43 pm
So now I’m back at how do I serve people cheaper than McDonald’s but at a higher quality? Which is certainly something McD’s asks itself everyday.
Isn’t this like trying to beat Walmart on price AND quality? These guys have immense benefits of scale and use lower quality products to drive down costs. Can you really compete with them on price?
http://www.dinnerissolvedchicago.com/pricing.html
August 21st, 2007 at 2:57 pm
How about this: you charge every customer 50 dollars for an awesome meal. They refer there friends and get 10$ in cash for every meal that they buy from you. If their friends refer other people they get 3$. They get 1 dollar for the two referals below that. So as long as your price per meal is less than 35 you are good.
I call this “what happens when viral meets pyramid” marketing. If only the Egyptians had come up with this strategy we would have hundreds of pyramids.
August 21st, 2007 at 2:57 pm
Fair enough. Maybe I don’t like the full amount I spend a week on food. I do take out most lunches and nights, so I probably spend 10 bucks on lunch and 20-30 bucks a day on food for dinner (for 2 people). Right now, just paying for me for lunch, that’s 5 lunches (usually eat a sandwich at home on weekend) and 12 to 14 dinners a week. So I’m probably spending on average 350 bucks a week on food. Seems kind of insane when I write it down. So maybe I’m willing to up my price if it’s put to me in the right way.
Do you think there’s no possible way to make it less expensive to get Boston Market quality meals 7 days a week for less than it costs to get takeout?
August 21st, 2007 at 2:59 pm
Also, what about the google ads on the meals. How did you turn this conversation so serious?
August 21st, 2007 at 3:09 pm
I think you could do this at $10/meal but it’d be really tricky and you’d have to get lucky with a creative chef. Not sure if this is scalable to a bigger business.
I’m all for more creative pricing. Why not figure out how to reduce takeout food pricing with google ads? Maybe they visit some website for $2 off their next order….
August 22nd, 2007 at 2:14 pm
This is what you want:
http://www.dinnerbydesignkitchen.com/
or
http://www.twokitchens.com/mealHowTo.php
This one is more of a special occasions one it seems, probably pricier:
http://www.diningbydesign.com/
August 22nd, 2007 at 11:49 pm
have you checked http://www.nutrisystem.com ?
August 23rd, 2007 at 2:56 pm
I think that you are a nerd.
On the other hand, I like the color blue that your website is. And, I think Kallie should get a shout-out.
August 26th, 2007 at 10:51 pm
Maybe you need to call Antonio??
August 27th, 2007 at 12:09 pm
ok, have you thought about a personal chef like someone who comes to your house and cooks like five meals for 2 people and leaves them ready to reheat. there are lots of people who have businesses like this, here is one for example: http://www.thehungrypeach.com/ServicesPrices.htm
It is a little pricy, but less than what you are currently spending, and you can stay home to eat.
January 7th, 2008 at 11:44 am
https://www.freshnfitcuisine.com/perfect_plan_loose_weight_program_diet_food_home_meals.asp
Looks like something like this is in Atlanta. I’m gonna check it out.
February 6th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
Looks like Seattle Sutton’s http://www.seattlesutton.com/ has a few franchises in Chicago doing just what you described. How has Fresh n Fit Cuisine been for you?
March 25th, 2009 at 10:23 am
I am on the Nutrisystem diet. Having to order every 4 weeks at $300 gets expensive.