Home Coffee Cafés Earning 50k+ Monthly - Tempting! Are Home-Based Coffee Shops Legal?

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The Rise of Home Cafés

Recently, the concept of home cafés has become popular! With changes in people's lifestyle and consumption habits, many residential communities have started to see numerous home cafés emerging. These cafés primarily serve the local residential areas, surrounding shops, and office buildings. Many owners have shared their earnings on various platforms, with some making several thousand to ten thousand yuan per month, while others even earn over 50,000 yuan monthly?!

According to one online user earning 50,000+ yuan monthly, they collaborated with popular influencers on Douyin while simultaneously promoting on WeChat and Xiaohongshu. Additionally, they trained students who opened coffee branches in other regions' physical stores. The preparation and delivery of coffee products were handled by themselves, friends, and family.

Thanks to effective pre-opening promotions, they achieved an average daily output of 60-80 cups within half a month of opening, reaching over 100 cups during peak periods. Ultimately, in one month, they gained 2 students, sold 57 packages of coffee beans, served 1,289 beverages, and acquired 113 members with prepaid accounts, achieving monthly revenue of over 50,000 yuan.

Such home café entrepreneurial stories have made many aspiring entrepreneurs eager to start!

The Hidden Challenges of Home Cafés

However, people only see the glamorous side. In reality, setting up a home café is not as easy as it appears.

Business License Issues

First, there's the issue of business licenses and health permits, which are impossible to obtain. For any business serving food, having the relevant certificates and qualifications is the most basic requirement.

If food safety issues occur involving compensation claims, they may be difficult to resolve. Operating without proper licenses and earning profit through homemade beverages or engaging in monetary transactions constitutes unlicensed business operation, which is illegal!

Product Pricing & Customer Flow

Next is customer traffic. Looking at the success stories mentioned above, we can see that the 50,000 yuan monthly revenue doesn't come solely from product sales. With limited beverage output, ingredients like milk and other materials must be purchased at retail prices (or slightly below retail), plus various costs, bringing the average selling price of each beverage to around 20 yuan.

Even if there are many coffee drinkers in the community and surrounding areas, if the pricing cannot create a competitive gap with existing coffee chain brands, why would consumers choose a home café?

Operating Costs

Then there's the cost issue. Many people calculating costs might think that home cafés save on rent, only needing to account for coffee equipment and various preparation and packaging materials?

Of course not! While home utilities may not be as expensive as commercial rates, they still represent costs. Even if you make the beverages yourself and have family members helping with delivery for free, these personnel costs and fuel expenses are still real costs that must be calculated.

Ideally, earning 50,000+ yuan monthly seems tempting, but after deducting various promotional expenses and costs, the actual profit might be negative.

Can home cafés make money? Perhaps, but not simply by selling coffee alone. Relying solely on coffee sales to recoup basic costs would be an extremely long and exhausting process.

Additionally, there's another phenomenon: from most home café photos shared on social media, we can see that the coffee equipment is surprisingly consistent, with just two or three brands appearing repeatedly.

Therefore, don't be misled by these impressive numbers. Money doesn't come easily, and all success requires effort. Moreover, this is still an illegal activity.

Image source: Internet

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