There are a lot of unexpected expenses with opening a business—especially one that serves delicious cupcakes and cookies. You realize that you forgot to get things like mops (4 at last count) trash cans, cleaning supplies, towels, additional baking tools (too many to mention), and additional aprons for staff to avoid doing laundry daily. Then there are the issues that crop up such as plumbing problems, electrical problems, and other mechanical issues. All of these are standard expenses that any bakery business owner soon learns are normal.
But then there are the issues that come up that are outside the norm. The one that most recently comes to mind is the story of the 75-dollar measuring spoon. If that sounds a bit expensive, bear with me and I will explain.
Since the beginning of the opening of The Frosted Sheep Bake Shop, we have had to deal with a few issues related to plumbing. After numerous overflows of the dish washing sinks, we finally had everything working by the grand opening. All was going smoothly, the sinks drained properly after much work to improve the ventilation of the pipes, and as a result I have been very careful while doing dishes to follow the plumber’s directions to ensure that everything continued to work perfectly.
About a week after opening, while showing up to wash dishes my wife Ann explained that we had a problem. It seems that somehow a measuring spoon had gone down the drain and could I get it out. Worried about making sure everything would continue to work in the dishwashing area, I went over to Ace Hardware (for about the hundredth time) and bought a magnet on a stick to try to rescue the spoon. After trying to get the spoon out for about an hour I called the plumber and explained what had happened. He came over, undid the pipes, and freed the spoon. Total cost for this was a very reasonable 75-dollars. On the positive side he said it was the right thing to do as the spoon was small enough to work its way through the pipes and create a serious clog problem, so disaster was avoided. In the negative column of the balance sheet, we now have a measuring spoon with a cost of 75-dollars plus the price of the spoon.
So, if you decide to open your own food service business be sure to keep track of measuring spoons in the dish sink so you, too, are not the owner of the world’s most expensive measuring spoon.
