Business guide for moms: letting popular food platters draw clients like Amazon and Facebook
This full-time mother inspires us with her success story, and her business guide for moms, in becoming a foodie entrepreneur. She is India Timmis, owner of Star Grazing Co. catering business and provides Instagram-friendly catering.
India Timmis is a successful entrepreneur that makes custom-designed food platters consisting of homemade, quality and good tasting foods, for clients that vary from families to British Airways and Amazon.
Business guide for moms – Keypoints:
- The birth of Star Grazing Co.
- Steps to Success;
- Quality Control;
- Gorgeous food platters and boxes;
- A few great tips;
- Star Grazing Co. zoom classes;
The birth of Star Grazing Co.
First, India realized that since catering is not new, and is in fact a competitive industry, held together for many caterers, by loyal clients.
Star Grazing Co. is no different. Forty percent of its business is referrals or repeat business and about 10% comes in via the company’s website.
Secondly, the catering industry is nowadays driven by referrals and social media.
Nearly 50% of the company’s clients arrive via the Star Grazing Co. Instagram page that has 37,000 followers.
Business guide for moms – The steps to success on her plan of action as a newcomer
1. India found and booked balloons from a balloons company with a big Instagram following.
2. She then rented and dressed up a party room,
3. and created party food platters for an envy-worthy photo-shoot for social media.
4. After posting, she tagged the right people, which of course included the popular balloon company.
“I made it very clear that everything was HOMEMADE, in capital letters — the pesto, the hummus — and took hundreds of photos. That fake setup was what I first went out with,” India said. And it worked! She got booked almost straight away.
She was booked to do a kids’ birthday grazing table.
Grazing Tables – Definition: aesthetic, artful arrangement and layout designs of abundant, food buffets. Often seen in luxury hotels, business or posh events like weddings.
Quality Control
“All the cakes are home-baked by me. I made a promise to myself that I’d never shop/buy, and the way to keep prices high was the homemade side — being organic and fresh, not stock from the cheapest supermarket around,” Timmis told Insider.
“Kids will eat what looks delicious, and if you mix some of their favourite sweets with colourful crudités and homemade dips, you will see wonderful results in what they learn to eat!”, India told The Sybarite.
Becoming a mom grew her interest in nutrition, and she was familiar with local delis and independent grocery shops that she could contact about wholesale possibilities.
“I didn’t make a single penny on that first booking — the car drank £60 in petrol — so I started to charge a delivery fee,” she admitted to Insider. Or alternatively, clients are welcome to collect their platter free of charge.
But as the event catering business took off, and weekends were booked, she found platters made more sense and dropped grazing tables. This was an obvious route for better time management, and the change was also pandemic-based.
Gorgeous Food Platters and Boxes
The one-of-a-kind platters are available in different size options, from about $197.
As each aesthetic roughly needs an hour to create, plus the cooking, preparing and baking of the food, she manages a maximum of 15 orders per 1 weekend.
Her biggest booking to date was for 100 boxes and a live Zoom masterclass, totalling at $5474.
Typically peak periods are: Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and Halloween and the long list of big names that Star Grazing Co company has worked with, include Facebook, Amazon, Toyota and British Airways.
“A sensational grazing table. We can’t wait to work with you again!” FACEBOOK
A few great tips from Star Grazing Co.
1. Use brownies to edge-frame a platter. They stick down and hold all rollaway items secure.
2. “Add your sandwiches last, and then wrap the platter right away so they stay fresh,” she added.
3. “… save the more luxurious, expensive items for the end so they’re on full display and the first thing clients look at.”
The beautiful platters’ set-up fee of $250.00 is added to a per person / design price and Food Boxes cost from $65 – $116 per box.
Star Grazing Co. Zoom Classes
Timmis now also teach platter-making classes over Zoom, or in person at $253 and $355 a person. The clients are both sign-ups for fun, or other entrepreneurs looking for business tips to get their start.
The course has has a two-month waiting list and already taught to over 200 students from around the world.
Timmis is next planning to publish a how-to, step-by-step, food-art book guide.
Star Grazing Co. is an inspiration to us all with her business guide for moms. Click here for more information
More inspiring success stories – Queen B, Bonang Matheba – amazing inspirational success – Bonang Matheba is lovingly nicknamed “Queen B” by her fans, and owner to many businesses, including her production house ‘Bonang Matheba Entertainment’.
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