Free template
Bakery business plan template for home and micro bakers
This bakery business plan template is a one-page sheet with twelve sections, covering what you sell, who buys it, your price and cost per item, startup costs, fixed monthly costs, a sales forecast, your break-even point and what you pay yourself per hour. Download it as CSV, open it in any spreadsheet, and replace the example answers for a home cake business with your own numbers. A plan this size fits a home or micro bakery far better than a 30-page document written for a bank.
| Section | Question to answer | Example answer | Number to fill in |
|---|---|---|---|
| Summary | What do you sell, to whom, and why you? | Custom celebration cakes made to order from home, for birthdays and family events in town | Monthly profit goal: $1,000 |
| Products | Which items will you sell? | Celebration cake, cupcake box of 12, cookie box of 12 | Number of products: 3 |
| Customers | Who buys and for what occasion? | Parents ordering birthday cakes, small offices, friends of past customers | Orders per month expected: 40 |
| Channels | Where do orders come from? | Messages and social media, one weekend market a month | Share of orders from market: 20% |
| Cost per item | What does each item cost to make? | Celebration cake: ingredients and packaging $18, 3 hours of work | Variable cost per cake: $18 |
| Price per item | What will you charge? | Celebration cake at $55, cupcake box at $36 | Average price: $55 |
| Startup costs | What must you buy before the first sale? | Mixer, pans, scale, packaging stock, labels, first ingredients | Total startup: $1,210 plus permit |
| Fixed monthly costs | What do you pay with zero orders? | Insurance, website, share of utilities, card fees | Fixed per month: $250 |
| Forecast | How many items a month, realistically? | 40 cakes in a normal month, fewer in January | Revenue: $2,200 |
| Break-even | How many sales cover fixed costs? | $250 / ($55 - $18) | Break-even: 7 cakes |
| Owner pay | What do you earn per hour? | $1,230 left over 120 hours of work | Per hour: $10.25 |
| Next 3 months | What will you change or test? | Raise cake price to $60, add a wholesale price list for one cafe | Target hourly pay: $15 |
What a bakery business plan needs to answer
A bakery business plan is not a formality. It answers three questions before you spend money: can you sell enough, at a price people pay, to cover your costs and still pay yourself for the hours you work? Everything in the template exists to answer one of those.
Most home bakers start with the menu and the logo. The plan starts with the numbers behind each product, because a beautiful cake that costs more to make than you charge is a hobby, not a business.
- Products: the five to ten items you will actually sell, not everything you can bake.
- Customers and channels: who buys, and where (orders by message, markets, cafes, wholesale).
- Cost and price per item: ingredients, packaging, your time and a share of overhead.
- Startup costs: what you must buy before the first sale.
- Fixed monthly costs: what you pay even in a month with no orders.
- Forecast and break-even: how many items a month you need to sell, and what is left.
How to fill in the bakery business plan template
Work top to bottom. Each row of the sheet has a section, the question to answer, an example answer and the number you need. Write short, honest answers; a plan you can read in five minutes is a plan you will update.
Cost and price is the row that decides the rest. Cost every product from its recipe: each ingredient by weight at what you paid, the box and board, the minutes it takes you, and a share of gas, electricity and equipment. If you only count flour and eggs, every number below it is wrong.
For startup costs, list what you need before the first order: equipment, pans, packaging stock, labels and the permit or registration your area requires. Rules and fees for home food businesses vary by state and county, so check with your local health department rather than guessing.
Worked example: a home cake business
These numbers are an example to show the math, not a benchmark. Say you sell celebration cakes at $55 each. Ingredients and packaging cost $18 per cake. Your fixed monthly costs (insurance, website, a share of utilities, card fees on a typical month) come to $250.
If you sell 40 cakes a month, revenue is 40 x $55 = $2,200. Variable costs are 40 x $18 = $720. Subtract the $250 of fixed costs and $1,230 is left before you pay yourself.
Break-even is fixed costs divided by what each cake leaves after its own costs: $250 / ($55 - $18) = 6.8, so the seventh cake of the month is the first that earns. Now the question most plans skip: if each cake takes three hours, 40 cakes is 120 hours, and $1,230 / 120 is about $10.25 an hour. That is the number that tells you whether to raise the price, cut hours per cake, or change the menu.
| Item | Example cost |
|---|---|
| Stand mixer | $450 |
| Pans, turntable, tools | $250 |
| Scale and thermometer | $60 |
| Packaging stock (boxes, boards) | $150 |
| Labels and branding | $100 |
| First ingredient order | $200 |
| Permit, registration, course | Check your county |
Keep the plan true once you open
A business plan written once goes stale the first time butter goes up. The cost per item, the forecast and the break-even all move when ingredient prices, order volume or your menu change.
Farinu keeps the numbers from the plan live. It costs each recipe from ingredients, packaging, sub-recipes, labour, machines and overhead, suggests prices from your target markup, and alerts you when an ingredient price rise eats into a product's margin. Customers, custom orders with deposits and balance payments, a sales log and a monthly P&L show what you actually earned against what the plan said.
Questions
- Is this bakery business plan template free?
- Yes. Download the sheet as CSV and open it in Google Sheets, Excel or Numbers. No account is needed.
- Do I need a business plan for a home bakery?
- You may not need one for a bank, but you need its numbers: your cost per item, a price that covers it, and how many sales a month pay your fixed costs and your time. One page is enough.
- How do I work out cost per item for the plan?
- Cost it from the recipe: each ingredient by weight at what you paid, plus packaging, your time and a share of overhead. Farinu does this for up to 10 recipes on the free plan.
Related pages
Get the numbers in your plan right
Create a free Farinu account to cost your recipes, set prices that cover your time, and see each month whether the plan is holding. Costing is free for up to 10 recipes; Team adds the rest.