Have you been contemplating where you're at in your life? 

Right at this very moment is what I'm talking about. Do you ever think you are supposed to be at another place in your life? 

Well, the truth is that you are exactly where you should be. You are exactly where you need to be right now. 

There is so much pressure to be reaching some sort of milestone, some career timeline or these huge goals, but I’m here to remind you that every single day you are laying the foundation of a new beginning. 

You are creating small decisions, small actions, small steps that are going to lead you to that big moment. 

You may not know what that moment looks like. It may be completely different from what you expect, but every single day you have the opportunity to do something small that will eventually lead you to your dream. 

So I want to give you that reminder that you are doing an amazing job! Those little things you're doing to move your dream along, the daily s...

• I can’t imagine if I would never have taken action and instead let my imposter syndrome get the best of me.

   

  I would never have been able to work in hundreds of beautiful estate kitchens with modern kitchen appliances, have the time and money for a 2-week vacation every single year, earn a stable and predictable income by booking regular meal prep clients, receive the satisfaction of helping my clients have dinners together as a family, gather and test thousands of recipes and compiling a super cookbook, keep my stress level low since I’m in charge of my own work hours and time off, and improve my cooking techniques greatly while practicing day after day.

   

  This all makes me feel successful. Being a personal chef has been a life changing career for me and it could be for you as well.

   

  What are you going to be able to do once your personal chef business takes off?

   

  What does success look like for you? 

  • Is it reaching a particular balance in your savings account?
  • Bu
  ...

LinkedIn can be a great space for meeting potential new clients in your community. Meeting one new person in your service area means possibly connecting with ten more, since that one new potential lead knows at least ten more friends who may be interested in your services.

Let's connect on LinkedIn >>  Approach the platform with professional politeness by including a note sharing how you know me! 

LinkedIn is a platform hosting hundreds of your target market customers. For you, it will be an online resume of your life in business. 

The course Personal Chef Business in 10 Weeks houses an entire lesson on generating leads from LinkedIn. Here's a snippet from the course on how to set up your profile.

Step 1: You’ll begin by creating or updating your LinkedIn profile.

Your profile should project a professional image and be well written. It’s okay to ask for a second opinion or a helping hand if writing is not one of your strengths.

We’ll start with something easy li...

I’ve been listening to cooks and chefs for years and have listed all the reasons they felt were stopping them from either starting or improving their personal chef businesses. Are any of these your reason?

Reason #1 "I'm not sure how to go about getting clients into my new business."  

TAKE ACTION: Did you know that getting leads is not the first step in taking your business off the ground? Identifying your ideal client is the first step, otherwise you won't know who to direct your marketing efforts toward.

Who is your ideal client? Learning marketing foundations is the key to a successful personal chef business. Luckily, marketing can be learned.

Reason #2 "It's too expensive to start a business." 

Start-up costs run about $500 for license and insurance for a full year. From there, you'll benefit from a website, about $250 a year. Other than that, you can run a slim business and skate by with no other expenses. 

Note that for exact business license or tax ce...

I received a message the other day from a chef working on putting together her mission statement. She had apparently been agonizing over her mission statement for weeks, but hadn't yet begun marketing for leads. 

This confused me since she hadn’t yet received her first client.

Do you ever find yourself getting lost in “busy work” thinking you’re propelling your business? Really, your concentration at the beginning should be getting new clients. You know this.

She should have been spending her time working on lead generating activities. What lead generating activities are YOU doing to get new meal prep or dinner party clients?

Remember, I created these courses with you in mind. You wanted to learn how to price your services, market for leads, and have templates to use in your meal prep business. 

They're all available here >>

Best Wishes & Much Success to You, Virginia Stockwell

Check out all Personal Chef Business Programs here >>

If you had a magic wand and could make your biggest challenge as a personal chef disappear, what would it be? 

Click one:

• I would be more confident.
• I would have my pricing figured out.
  
• I would have a full roster of clients.
  
• I would have a completed business plan.

Taking action sooner than later will always bring you closer to your ideal life. The best time to start is yesterday and the second best time to start is today!

Best Wishes & Much Success to You, Virginia Stockwell

I think a lot of aspiring personal chefs spend time asking the wrong question.

The question usually sounds something like:

"How do I get clients?"

It seems logical enough, but it skips over something much more important.

Why would someone hire you in the first place?

Until that question has an answer, marketing becomes difficult because you're trying to attract people before you've identified what makes your service worth choosing.

The Difference Between Thinking About a Business and Running One

At some point, every aspiring business owner reaches a stage where more research stops producing useful answers.

You can spend weeks reading about pricing, websites, marketing, and branding. None of those activities will tell you whether families in your community are willing to pay for the service you're offering.

The only place that answer exists is in conversations with potential clients.

A consultation reveals things a hundred articles never will.

People tell you what they strugg...

One of the biggest misconceptions about the personal chef business is that there is a fixed salary or hourly wage attached to the profession.

There is not.

Personal chefs usually charge by the service, not by the hour, which means income varies widely depending on:

• number of clients
• service type
• pricing structure
• schedule
• geography
• demand
• whether the chef works alone or hires help

That flexibility is one of the reasons many people are drawn to the business in the first place.

How Personal Chefs Typically Make Money

Most personal chefs combine multiple income streams instead of relying on one type of service.

The most common include:

• weekly meal prep
• private dinner parties
• cooking classes
• small events
• seasonal holiday work
• specialty dietary services

Meal prep tends to become the foundation because recurring weekly clients create more predictable income.

Private events and cooking classes are often layered on top of that base schedule.

What Meal Prep Clients...

You can't decide today that you're going to be a personal chef, then start tomorrow full-time. First, you'll need to build the foundation of the business by checking out the competition, learning to price your services, and understanding the logistics of running a meal prep business. Building the foundation will probably take about 30 days. During this time, you can continue to work at your current job to pay the bills.

Next, you'll begin marketing your services and start accepting clients. It's suggested to start with just one or two clients, perfecting your meal prep system over 30 to 60 days of practice.

Now you're ready to begin getting more leads into your business and ramp up to full-time with the goal of finally quitting your current job. As an alternative, you can choose to only work with one to two clients as supplemental income while keeping your current job. Understanding how marketing and advertising work is a key skill in determining how fast your business will ...

Private individuals are hiring you as a personal chef, not companies or institutions. When someone calls to set up a consultation about hiring you as their personal chef, all they're thinking about is, "how can you help me?" They just want to know if you’re able to help them with their problem.

Potential clients are thinking about menu offerings you can provide them for meal prep or their event. They’re not at all wondering where you went to school, how long you’ve been in business, or what your liability insurance covers. Their only concern is how you can help them.

Regardless of your culinary education or business experience, there are clients for every background, experienced or novice. Everyone had to start somewhere and everyone has a first day in business.