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Meal Prep Club Tips
Running A Meal Prep Club can be a little complex until you get the hang of it, but with a few tips and tricks, you can make it much easier to host your own Meal Prep Parties.
If you nail all of these tips, you’ll even be able to make money running your own Meal Prep Party from home.
List Of Tips For Running A Successful Meal Prep Club From Home
1 – Everyone Must Pay Ahead.
You must require that your club members pay ahead for each Meal Prep Party.
If you don’t require people pay ahead, you’re going to get stuck with the extra ingredients that can quickly take your Meal Prep Club from a profitable side-hustle to a money drain.
At least at first, everyone in your club is going to be your friend. Explain to them that you can’t pay for ingredients for other people. They’ll understand.
2 – Have Clear, Concise, & Firm Cancellation Policy.
It doesn’t do any good to have people pay ahead if the can cancel when something comes up.
Most of us have kids at home, and we know that things are going to come up. But one person’s emergency can’t become an emergency for the whole club.
Your Cancellation Policy should require any cancellations to take place before you begin to prepare the combined shopping list. That’s at least three days before the Meal Prep Party Day.
Now what happens when someone can’t show up is up to you, but it must be clear, concise, and provided to every club member in writing.
I’ve seen the owners of Meal Prep Clubs have a range of policies, but here are some of the more common and imaginative policies.
Food Prep Club Policies Regarding No-Shows:
- No Refund, No Food. Sorry. You can always send someone in your place, which is a nice way for others to learn about our club.
- Other club members will prepare your food for you, but you owe them. Most clubs who choose this option have a surcharge that is paid when the meals are picked up with that extra money split between the club members on the next Meal Prep Day. It needs to be enough that everyone in the club gets $5 or more off of their next order and that the person who missed the Prep Party feels a little pain. I even heard of one club that required the no-show to bring three bottles of wine when the picked up their meals…bottles of wine to be opened at the next Meal Prep Party.
- We Got Your Back. Some clubs just make the meals for the no-show because they are all friends. If you choose to do this, you need to have in writing that missing more than X prep days in any given 12 months will get you uninvited to future Meal Prep Parties. I’m not a big fan of this policy unless your club is made up of family and very close friends, but even in that case, I think it’s a recipe for drama. I hate drama.
- Half Refund & Meals Shared By Other Members. With this policy, the no-show gets some of their money back, and the rest of the members split the meals made from the extra ingredients. This is another one that I’m not a big fan of because it adds complexity to the Meal Prep Party. I don’t want to spend my time with friends debating who gets extra servings of which meals. That’s not fun.
3 – Use Good Recipe Software
Creating a compiled shopping list for three to eight meals (I’ve seen clubs in that whole range) for three to ten families is hard. Really crazy hard. Doing it by hand will take you hours and I guarantee you will still make mistakes.
Invest in some good recipe software, it’s going to save you countless hours and headaches.
A full discussion of recipe software would require it’s own article, but I’ll toss out my current favorite software package below.
First, with my policy of full transparency with you, I want to say that I don’t use the software I’m recommending below.
Instead, I have my own proprietary software that we use to run my Meal Prep Delivery Business, and I’ve spent many thousands of dollars developing it to do everything I need. Even though I don’t use this software, because I’ve developed my own software, I know what needed in goog recipe software.
With that said, onward!
The best off-the-shelf Meal Prep Club Recipe Software that I’ve found is MasterCook Recipe.
It allows you to build recipes, meal plans, menus, and scale those meal plans for as many servings as you need for all of your Meal Prep Club Members.
You can learn more about MasterCook Recipes on Amazon. { See On Amazon >> }
4 – Use Good Meal Prep Club Containers
I read a Disney book years ago that focused on their customer service. At the time, the highest-paid hourly park employee was the person who drove the bus to and from the parking lot. Walt Disney believed that if a family had a bad experience on the way back to their car, that is all they would remember.
With that in mind, buy good containers for your club member’s prepared meals, and make sure to include that cost when deciding how much each member needs to contribute to cover costs and your time.
For items to go in ZipLock Bags, go with name brand freezer bags.
For prepared meals that need aluminum pans, get heavy-duty pans with lids. { See Similar Ones To Those We Use On Amazon >>> }
5 – Keep It Fun!
Yes, everyone here is attending to get some meal prep work done, but it doesn’t have to be grueling work.
There is a reason that many call this home food business a Food Prep Party instead of a Food Prep Club.
To turn your meal prep work day in to a party that your friends will look forward to all month long consider some of these ideas used in other Meal Prep Parties.
- Wine & Work Meal Prep Party
- Combine a Book Club & Meal Prep Club into a Party
- Include An Ongoing Trivia Contest
- Create a Club Meal Prep Recipe Book
- Have A Baby Sitter In The Back Yard
Conclusion & One Last Bonus Tip
If you follow these tips, you’ll soon have a great food business that is fun and rewarding.
But keep in mind that it’s going to take time to work out the kinks of hosting a Meal Prep Party. Enjoy the journey.
Bonus Tip To Running A Great Meal prep Business
Start small with a group of family and friend who love you and are ready to help you find joy in the journey.
Starting with just two or three guests and a limited menu of two or three items will make it much easier to learn the ropes.
If you have other ideas, please let me know in the comments below and we’ll add it to the list for those who are just starting a Meal Prep Club from home.
~Stacey
