Personal Chef Business Business Cards Tips & Truths

I may earn money or products from the companies mentioned in this post.

My wife and I started a personal chef business in 2005 with rudimentary cards printed using our home computer printer. Honestly, those were some ugly business cards, but they did what they needed to do without us spending money we did not have.

Since then, our little personal chef business has grown to become our home-based prepared meal delivery business that we still operate today as our family’s primary source of income.

In those many years, we’ve had about half-a-dozen versions of our business cards and in each version, we’ve improved based upon our mistakes and successes.

In this article, we’re going to share what we’ve learned about personal chef business cards.

Let’s start with the basics.

Does A Personal Chef Business Need Business Cards?

A personal chef business needs business cards to be able to grow brand awareness and attract new personal chef clients.

As mobile devices continue to become more integrated into our daily lives, there will be a time in the future where business cards are not necessary for a small business, but that time is not yet here.

When you meet someone for the first time who might be interested in your new personal chef business, you need to have a business card to hand them.

That business card is a reminder that they met someone with an interesting business that might empower them to make their lives better.

In the coming days, they’ll look at that card as they ponder contacting you.

A business card is essential to your new personal chef business.

What Should And Shouldn’t Be On A Small Business Business Card?

As we delve into what should and shouldn’t be on a business card, keep in mind the story I told above about how a potential client interacts with your business card.

That card is speaking for you when you are not standing in front of that person.

It’s not just your contact information, it’s your proverbial ‘foot-in-the-door’ for turning that acquaintance into a new personal chef customer.

What Must Be On A Small Food Business Business Card?

Some things are essential and must be on every small business’ business card.

These essentials are primarily contact-information details. However, you have to keep in mind that we live in a modern world so it has to include more than a phone number.

The Home Based Food Business Card Essential Information

• Business Name
• Business Tag Line
• Contact Name & Title
• Phone Number
• Physical Address (if you are not a home-based business)
• Email Address & Website URL

Now let’s quickly talk about each of these essentials and what purpose they serve.

Business Name

A potential client needs to know how to refer to your business and how to tell their friends and family about this life-changing service they just discovered. They need to begin to develop brand awareness which starts with just knowing your business’ name.

If you are still looking for the perfect name, check out the article 199 Personal Chef Business Name Ideas.

~Stacey

Business Tag Line

A tag line helps people more clearly understand what service your business offers.

For example; “Family Dinners Made Easy” or “Your Supper Solution”.

I discussed tag lines in more detail in the article I wrote about naming your new personal chef business. { Click Here to read that article. >>> }.

Contact Name & Title

Your potential client might soon by calling or emailing to ask questions.

People are more comfortable calling a business when they know who they are going to be talking to.

Phone Number

No details needed here…you know you gotta have a phone number, but a cell phone # is fine.

Ideally, this will be a text-able phone number. About 30% of our customers primarily communicate with us via text, and that percentage goes up each and every year.

Physical Address

Only include a physical address if you are going to have customers visit a physical location. All of my small businesses are home-based, and I never include my home address on my business cards.

Email Address & Website URL

We live in a modern world, and your new personal chef business must have some kind of online presence.

You must have an email address for people to contact you.

Ideally, you need a website { Click Here for a discussion of food business websites. >>> }, but at the very least you need a page on Facebook. If you’d like an article about creating a Food Business Facebook Page leave a comment below.

What Might Be On A Small Food Business’ Business Cards?

I reserve the backside of my business cards for optional information about my business. That optional information might include:

• A Very Short Elevator Pitch
• A List Of Problems That Your Service Solves
• A List Of Kinds Of People Who Use Your Service
• Your Picture & Short Bio

This is the part of my business cards that I’ve changed the most often.

My current version has a list of the kinds of people that use our meal delivery service. When my current cards are all handed out, I think I’ll go to “a very short elevator pitch” on the back of my card.

Recently, I’ve become a huge fan of “Story Brand” for telling my various businesses stories with my customers being the hero of the story. I’ll use their model when I redo my business cards.

~Stacey

What Should Not Be On A Small Food Business’s Business Cards

Keep in mind that business cards are not ‘digital’ (at least not primarily), and that means that most of your social media accounts shouldn’t be on your business cards.

People are not going to type in long website addresses to find your Instagram or Facebook account.

• Your Facebook Page
• Your Instagram Page
• Your Twitter Account
• Your Physical Address (Assuming you have a home-based food business)

The last item on that list above is your physical address. If you don’t have people regularly visiting your place of business, then you don’t want your address on your business card.

My family runs home-based food businesses, and because of that my home-address never appears on my business cards or on my google local business listings.

Sample Personal Chef Business Card Templates

Below are images of my current Prepared Meal Delivery Business’ Business Cards. These are very similar to my old business cards for our Personal Chef Business, and I think they’ll give you an idea of how to design your own business cards.

Don’t copy our cards, but feel free to take the best ideas and make them your own.

When you’re done, how about you send me (Stacey@FoodBusinessPros.com) your business card to share with other new small food business owners? Or if you already have a business card, send it to me too.

How cool would it be if you and I create a collection of actual food biz business cards for people to get inspiration from?!?!

How Are You Going To Design Your First Business Cards?

I use the adobe suite of tools for all my graphic design and marketing work, but I didn’t start there. Instead I used the free tools offered by every printer who prints business cards.

This printer’s tools will either be a super simple online drag-and-drop business card creator tool or a real-person designer who’s ready to help you get the design you need.

Your first business cards don’t have to be perfect, so don’t spend your limited time learning graphic design skills.

Instead just use the free tools offered by your printer.

Where To Get Personal Chef Business Cards?

I’ve purchased business cards online and locally; both have their pros and cons.

Likewise, how I print business cards has changed as my business matured and started making real money.

Honest truth…our very first business cards were done in B&W, printed on our home printer, and then hand cut. We were broke and we don’t do debt. They were good enough to get us our first personal chef clients.

A few months later, when we had a few dollars I wanted 100 real business cards to get us to the next level. My local print shops were not real excited about running such a small order.

But then I found a coupon online for 100 ‘free’ business cards. The shipping on those cards was ridiculous, but they were still more affordable than buying local.

Now I get a thousand cards at a time printed locally, and that many cards will last us at least a year.

I’d suggest you start out getting your business cards online and once you have the cash to buy local go that way.

~Stacey