Employee & Freelancer Expenses

$151

$352

Website Costs

$223

$7,215

Business Formation Fees

$600

$4,700

Equipment & Supply Expenses

$66

$700

Retail Business Expenses

$1,250

$11,650

Inventory Expenses

$350

$14,750

Food Business Expenses

$2,125

$36,000

Software Expenses

$150

$2,470

Advertising & Marketing Costs

$75

$5,286

Total Startup Costs

$4,990

$83,123

Built Bar

builtbar.com

90,318

RXBAR

rxbar.com

111,483

YouBar

youbars.com

115,515

Advocare

advocare.com

124,352

Quaker Oats

quakeroats.com

139,429

Love Good Fats

lovegoodfats.com

169,026

Verb Energy

verbenergy.co

192,528

Canadian Protein

canadianprotein.com

203,473

Amazing Grass

amazinggrass.com

217,525

Bobo's

eatbobos.com

219,134

True Nutrition

truenutrition.com

254,495

Flexibility

You can put as much time into the business as you'd like. If you like the work and have some initial experience, you can start small and manage all aspects of the business on your own.

Scalable

With businesses and processes changing daily, there will always be demand for new features, products and services for your business. Additionally, there are several different business models and pricing tiers you can implement that will allow you to reach all types of customers.

Meaningful business connections

You never know who you will meet as a protein bar company. This could be the start of an incredible business opportunity!

High customer retention rates

Once a customer invests in your product, they've invested their time and energy to utilize your product/service which is highly valuable to them. Typically, your product or service becomes indispensable to your customer.

High margins

The gross margins for your protein bar company are typically around 45%, which is considerably high and allows you to grow your business and manage costs easily.

Easy to encourage "impulse buy"

In the protein bar company, you have a much higher chance of encouraging your customers to buy on impulse - you can easily alter the price, placement, packaging, and promotional value to influence the decision of your buyer.

Motivation of employees

If you plan to have a sales/content team on board, finding creative ways to motivate them can be a challenge. It's important that you're able to offer great incentives and a good work environment for your employees.

High employee turnover

In the protein bar company, employee turnover is often high, which can be quite costly and time consuming for your business. It's important to try and avoid this as much as possible by offering competitive pay, benefits, and a positive work environment.

Taxes

As a protein bar company, you typically pay self-employment taxes which can be quite high. It's important to understand what you will be paying in taxes each year so you can determine if the work you're taking on is worth it.

High overhead expenses

With starting a protein bar company, there are overhead expenses that come with selling a physical product. You will want to make sure you strategically budget for these overhead costs. We discuss this more in the startup costs section below.

You may need to charge sales tax

If you are selling your products in various states, you may be required to charge sales tax. Although this may not impact your financials specifically, it can be a headache to create a process and procedure for this. To learn more about sales tax, check out this article

Time commitment

With starting a protein bar company, all responsibilities and decisions are in your hands. Although this is not necessarily a negative thing, work life can take over at times. This can place a strain on friends and family and add to the pressure of launching a new business.