7 ms·

Free business idea: A store dedicated to exactly this. Imagine instead of many different, individually packaged, products, you have one (or maybe a handful) of

by koolba 8y ago

Free business idea: A store dedicated to exactly this. Imagine instead of many different, individually packaged, products, you have one (or maybe a handful) of pre-packaged meals for one or two people. The retail space and checkout would be insanely efficient as you'd just grab and go. You'd have the green angle too as there wouldn't be any excess packaging to keep the food fresh nor carbon emissions from all the individual deliveries. Just standard refrigerators and pictures of happy patrons walking home with their meal kits. The recurring subscription model, i.e. the holy grail of high valuations, could be added as well. Either through the usual $X/period gets you Y meals or maybe just a discount ($Z/month to get Q% off). Or taking it to the next level, imagine a meal kit vending machine. The owner would stock it each day (say around 3pm) and customers could grab their own meals with a quick swipe of their card. Same idea as the store but reducing the retail space from a mini store to a couple square feet.

dboreham 8y ago
I think you described Mark's and Spencer food stores.
- te_chris 8y ago
  Was going to say, sounds somewhat like M&S
- Willwhatley 8y ago
  Are their only sites in Hong Kong and Macau? This is the site linked from the only location I could find in Google Maps. http://global.marksandspencer.com/hk/store-locator/ http://global.marksandspencer.com/hk/store-locator/
  - ghaff 8y ago
    They're all over the UK at least.
    - Willwhatley 8y ago
      Ok, thanks. I do not get over the pond much.
criley2 8y ago
I've always thought about this. Basically, drive through for dinner kits and/or a Uber Eats for dinner kits. You drive up, and you can get: - Kit of ingredients and instructions for a home cooked meal - Kit of prepped ingredients for a home cooked meal - A pre-cooked meal ready to take home and eat By combining with an app/website/service, you would develop meal plans, number of portions, food allergies. You could walk up and pay full price, or get a discount by pre-buying a meal plan that gives the store more ability to plan and purchase in bulk. I think the key to profit here is healthy, local, appropriately priced meal kits for families.
marak830 8y ago
As a chef, I have seriously considered this. Unfourtanetly I live in Japan now, there isn't as much of a customer base for this sort of thing as say, Australia. Then again, the more I think about it. You know if you added in a system of reusable containers (for small amounts of spices and herbs), which could be returned for a discount on your next order. . . Still a hell of a lot to consider, but in a busy enough place (eg Tokyo), might be an interesting idea.
joshvm 8y ago
You have partially described Cook, in the UK https://www.cookfood.net/ https://www.cookfood.net/ They only sell ready meals, aiming to be a higher quality than the slops you can buy in supermarkets. They've won several Great Taste awards here, which is a fairly well-respected stamp of approval. Perhap the main difference from what you're suggesting is that they're not ingredient kits, they're prepared meals or components (e.g. main/side/dessert). They have high street shops in - let's be honest - rich parts of the country like the South East. Quality seems quite good and the price isn't that bad - at most £5 per person with reasonable break points for couples, families. The store itself is a few rows of freezers. I've never tried, but people I know say that it's good if you need an emergency meal that actually tastes nice.
- hammock 8y ago
  Also check out Eatzi's in Texas.
  - bfuller 8y ago
    Eatzi's is AMAZING. Its more of a market where you can get food and readymade meals. They make pizza on fridays and the line goes out the door. Highly recommended. They also have opera singers once a week.
ISL 8y ago
It would be hard to offer differentiation from the grab-and-go setup at our local QFC (a Kroger subsidiary). If I wanted to grab one of their prepared meals and nothing else, I think I could walk in, pick up a prepared meal, and check out in 2-3 minutes. The greater cost is the time required to drive to the store. The only reason we haven't yet tried a prepared meal is pricing. If prices dropped ~30%, we would be regular buyers.
Itaxpica 8y ago
There was a store in Brooklyn a few years ago called Walk-In Cookbook. They did exactly this, plus if you called or set up a recurring subscription they would deliver the kits to anywhere within a mile or so of the store (which in New York City is a pretty good radius). They also sold basic cooking equipment, so if you were a novice cook you didn't even have to worry about getting gear. They even partnered with local restaurants to provide cross-branded kits based on their recipes. It was a great business that people in the neighborhood loved, but it also lost a ton of money and closed in under a year. I'm still sad about it.
kodablah 8y ago
Some of this is implemented by https://eatzis.com https://eatzis.com (and to a lesser extent, parts of https://centralmarket.com https://centralmarket.com). Granted not the technical/quick aspects.
brianbreslin 8y ago
Why need a full storefront? Why not make them kiosks that others can put in their existing stores to boost foot traffic? i could see this being something walgreens added (like redbox).
lifeformed 8y ago
This place does that: https://dreamdinners.com/main.php?static=how_it_works https://dreamdinners.com/main.php?static=how_it_works It's custom prepared for you though, so you could probably cut back on costs by making them more of a grab-and-go thing.
digikata 8y ago
Or maybe they could deliver it direct to peoples homes too! Since 1952 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwan's_Company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwan's_Company
cabaalis 8y ago
In my town there is super suppers which does just this. Buy meals you can freeze that you just drop in the oven.
tedmiston 8y ago
FWIW one of the Kroger stores in Cincinnati where they do pilots does offer this. There are self-checkout lanes nearby too, so you can be in and out in 5 minutes. It's not a dedicated store but it's a good approximation of the experience.
- gm-conspiracy 8y ago
  How many minutes does it take you to park?
  - tedmiston 8y ago
    It's a big lot in a shopping complex, maybe 5 minutes from pulling in the lot to walking in the door. They have special parking spots up front for people picking up ClickList orders. It'd be interesting to see if those were made available for this too. I suppose you could probably even order the meal kit via ClickList and have it brought to your car (+= $5).
josephjrobison 8y ago
Snap Kitchen [1], based in Austin, TX but also in rest of Texas and Philadelphia has been doing this for years, they already have 35 locations. People definitely love them. They even have a food truck/trailer concept for the business crowd downtown. They are a bit pricey-ish but not too bad. Seems to work for their target market (on the go professionals and middle upper income families)! My Fit Foods had about 50 locations and was popular but shut down [2], but from what I read management was poor and quality dropped more so than it was bad economics [3]. [1] https://www.snapkitchen.com/locations/ https://www.snapkitchen.com/locations/ [2] https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/13/austin-healthy-meal-company-my-fit-foods-abruptly.html https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/13/austin-he... [3] https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/5tphuu/my_fit_foods_closes_all_stores_nationwide/ddp6idi/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/5tphuu/my_fit_foods...
- deadmetheny 8y ago
  We have a very similar concept here in the Midwest called Eat Fit Go. Definitely a decent choice for food quality, although they too can be a bit on the expensive side.
personlurking 8y ago
I was in the Dominican Republic recently and went to a major supermarket, where I saw both a cold and heated foods section full of great tasting, healthy food, individually packaged. I ate like that for the whole week I was there, and it only cost me a few bucks at checkout. In Brazil, one can easily get "marmitas" (aka "quentinhas") delivered for cheap, which are ready-made meals. Now I'm in the EU and have been seeing low-cost, healthy, packaged meals in many supermarkets. Seems to have caught on. When I look at two basic options now, I see chicken breasts for 3.50 euro or a ready-made meal for 2-3 euro. Even though the chicken would be enough for two meals, I'm often pulled in by the easier, one-meal option.

by koolba 8y ago

dboreham 8y ago

I think you described Mark's and Spencer food stores.

te_chris 8y ago
Was going to say, sounds somewhat like M&S
Willwhatley 8y ago
Are their only sites in Hong Kong and Macau? This is the site linked from the only location I could find in Google Maps. http://global.marksandspencer.com/hk/store-locator/ http://global.marksandspencer.com/hk/store-locator/
- ghaff 8y ago
  They're all over the UK at least.
  - Willwhatley 8y ago
    Ok, thanks. I do not get over the pond much.

criley2 8y ago

I've always thought about this. Basically, drive through for dinner kits and/or a Uber Eats for dinner kits. You drive up, and you can get: - Kit of ingredients and instructions for a home cooked meal - Kit of prepped ingredients for a home cooked meal - A pre-cooked meal ready to take home and eat By combining with an app/website/service, you would develop meal plans, number of portions, food allergies. You could walk up and pay full price, or get a discount by pre-buying a meal plan that gives the store more ability to plan and purchase in bulk. I think the key to profit here is healthy, local, appropriately priced meal kits for families.

marak830 8y ago

As a chef, I have seriously considered this. Unfourtanetly I live in Japan now, there isn't as much of a customer base for this sort of thing as say, Australia. Then again, the more I think about it. You know if you added in a system of reusable containers (for small amounts of spices and herbs), which could be returned for a discount on your next order. . . Still a hell of a lot to consider, but in a busy enough place (eg Tokyo), might be an interesting idea.

joshvm 8y ago

You have partially described Cook, in the UK https://www.cookfood.net/ https://www.cookfood.net/ They only sell ready meals, aiming to be a higher quality than the slops you can buy in supermarkets. They've won several Great Taste awards here, which is a fairly well-respected stamp of approval. Perhap the main difference from what you're suggesting is that they're not ingredient kits, they're prepared meals or components (e.g. main/side/dessert). They have high street shops in - let's be honest - rich parts of the country like the South East. Quality seems quite good and the price isn't that bad - at most £5 per person with reasonable break points for couples, families. The store itself is a few rows of freezers. I've never tried, but people I know say that it's good if you need an emergency meal that actually tastes nice.

hammock 8y ago
Also check out Eatzi's in Texas.
- bfuller 8y ago
  Eatzi's is AMAZING. Its more of a market where you can get food and readymade meals. They make pizza on fridays and the line goes out the door. Highly recommended. They also have opera singers once a week.

ISL 8y ago

It would be hard to offer differentiation from the grab-and-go setup at our local QFC (a Kroger subsidiary). If I wanted to grab one of their prepared meals and nothing else, I think I could walk in, pick up a prepared meal, and check out in 2-3 minutes. The greater cost is the time required to drive to the store. The only reason we haven't yet tried a prepared meal is pricing. If prices dropped ~30%, we would be regular buyers.

Itaxpica 8y ago

There was a store in Brooklyn a few years ago called Walk-In Cookbook. They did exactly this, plus if you called or set up a recurring subscription they would deliver the kits to anywhere within a mile or so of the store (which in New York City is a pretty good radius). They also sold basic cooking equipment, so if you were a novice cook you didn't even have to worry about getting gear. They even partnered with local restaurants to provide cross-branded kits based on their recipes. It was a great business that people in the neighborhood loved, but it also lost a ton of money and closed in under a year. I'm still sad about it.

kodablah 8y ago

Some of this is implemented by https://eatzis.com https://eatzis.com (and to a lesser extent, parts of https://centralmarket.com https://centralmarket.com). Granted not the technical/quick aspects.

brianbreslin 8y ago

Why need a full storefront? Why not make them kiosks that others can put in their existing stores to boost foot traffic? i could see this being something walgreens added (like redbox).

lifeformed 8y ago

This place does that: https://dreamdinners.com/main.php?static=how_it_works https://dreamdinners.com/main.php?static=how_it_works It's custom prepared for you though, so you could probably cut back on costs by making them more of a grab-and-go thing.

digikata 8y ago

Or maybe they could deliver it direct to peoples homes too! Since 1952 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwan's_Company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwan's_Company

cabaalis 8y ago

In my town there is super suppers which does just this. Buy meals you can freeze that you just drop in the oven.

tedmiston 8y ago

FWIW one of the Kroger stores in Cincinnati where they do pilots does offer this. There are self-checkout lanes nearby too, so you can be in and out in 5 minutes. It's not a dedicated store but it's a good approximation of the experience.

gm-conspiracy 8y ago
How many minutes does it take you to park?
- tedmiston 8y ago
  It's a big lot in a shopping complex, maybe 5 minutes from pulling in the lot to walking in the door. They have special parking spots up front for people picking up ClickList orders. It'd be interesting to see if those were made available for this too. I suppose you could probably even order the meal kit via ClickList and have it brought to your car (+= $5).

josephjrobison 8y ago

Snap Kitchen [1], based in Austin, TX but also in rest of Texas and Philadelphia has been doing this for years, they already have 35 locations. People definitely love them. They even have a food truck/trailer concept for the business crowd downtown. They are a bit pricey-ish but not too bad. Seems to work for their target market (on the go professionals and middle upper income families)! My Fit Foods had about 50 locations and was popular but shut down [2], but from what I read management was poor and quality dropped more so than it was bad economics [3]. [1] https://www.snapkitchen.com/locations/ https://www.snapkitchen.com/locations/ [2] https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/13/austin-healthy-meal-company-my-fit-foods-abruptly.html https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2017/02/13/austin-he... [3] https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/5tphuu/my_fit_foods_closes_all_stores_nationwide/ddp6idi/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Austin/comments/5tphuu/my_fit_foods...

deadmetheny 8y ago
We have a very similar concept here in the Midwest called Eat Fit Go. Definitely a decent choice for food quality, although they too can be a bit on the expensive side.

personlurking 8y ago

I was in the Dominican Republic recently and went to a major supermarket, where I saw both a cold and heated foods section full of great tasting, healthy food, individually packaged. I ate like that for the whole week I was there, and it only cost me a few bucks at checkout. In Brazil, one can easily get "marmitas" (aka "quentinhas") delivered for cheap, which are ready-made meals. Now I'm in the EU and have been seeing low-cost, healthy, packaged meals in many supermarkets. Seems to have caught on. When I look at two basic options now, I see chicken breasts for 3.50 euro or a ready-made meal for 2-3 euro. Even though the chicken would be enough for two meals, I'm often pulled in by the easier, one-meal option.