Home baking business and insurance

Mrslane

I’m setting up a small home baking business. Been doing cakes for family and friends for a while but others are asking me too now so I need to get all set up legitimately.
Have done the company registration and initial talks with EHO ahead of inspection so that side of things is all ok.
But what to do about insurance? As in house insurance. My home insurance doesn’t cover commercial activity so I don’t want to take my chances in case I ever did need to make a claim and found it was all invalid because I baked a few cakes each week. It’s not necessarily business insurance I need either (I don’t think!). Anyone know anything about this? Cheers.

soc

Perhaps contact IOMST? They may be able to advise you

phormium

You need to advise your house insurers about the business, some don't like and won't continue on with the policy. For the business itself you need product and public liability, Pike Insurances have a policy specifically for home baking, it will cover callers to your house etc but does not replace the need to advise house insurers.

If your existing house insurers throw a strop when you mention it then Pike know which house insurers are ok with it so can advise you. If you are doing deliveries you need to advise car insurer too.

Questi0ns

Hi, I'm also thinking of doing the same during the summer months when I have more time on my hands. But I have to ask the obvious question...Does it pay? In terms of hours put into cooking, ingredients, time selling, profit etc.
i used to have a hobby shop on etsy which was pretty fun for a year, but I came to a point where I realised the hours put in did not really show any profit. It was just a hobby which is grand within itself but dont really feel like doing that again. Anyone have the experience to advise? Many thanks

phormium

No would be my answer, market is saturated with home bakers with a race to the bottom on pricing so it's pretty hard to make any decent profit unless you go into it big time and can utilise economies of scale and use catering ingredients such as cheap marg etc.

Plus if you only intend doing it for the summer you'll still have to pay a yearly insurance premium, not the biggest cost but nevertheless a cost to be factored in.