The honest answer is: far less than most people expect if you start from home, and far more than they expect if they start with a commercial kitchen before they have customers. What decides your startup cost is not your menu but your model — and whether customers pay you before or after you cook.
Three ways to start, three very different budgets
- Home-based. You cook in your own kitchen for a few dozen customers. You need registration, containers, some bigger pots and a way to take orders and payments. This is the leanest start, but check the rules first: in the UK and India it is allowed with registration, while in most US states perishable meals from a home kitchen are not.
- Commercial kitchen. You rent a licensed kitchen. Now you are paying rent, a deposit, utilities and usually staff from the first month, before the customers arrive to cover it.
- Cloud kitchen add-on. You already run a delivery kitchen and add a subscription line. The kitchen costs are sunk; the new spend is mostly packaging, riders and software.
A line-by-line startup budget
Here is what to budget for. The ranges are an illustrative example for a small home-based start in India — prices vary a lot by city, so use it as a checklist rather than a quote.
| Item | Illustrative budget | Why you need it |
|---|---|---|
| FSSAI basic registration | ₹100 a year (government fee) | Required to sell food in India |
| Containers and insulated bags (~30 customers) | ₹5,000–₹15,000 | Two sets per customer if you wash and reuse |
| Kitchen upgrades | ₹10,000–₹50,000 | Larger vessels, an extra burner, fridge space |
| Launch marketing | ₹3,000–₹10,000 | Flyers, a paid trial week, local ads |
| First ingredients | Depends on volume | Covered by prepayments if you ask for them |
| Software | ₹0 to start | WhatsApp and a spreadsheet work at first |
A commercial kitchen adds rent and a deposit, commercial equipment, gas and power connections, and staff wages before your first delivery. Those are the costs that sink new kitchens — which is why testing demand from home or a shared kitchen first is usually wise.
The cost most people forget: working capital
Before your first payment arrives, you buy ingredients, packaging and fuel. If customers pay at the end of the month, you are lending them a month of meals — and that money has to come from somewhere.
The fix is simple and standard in the tiffin world: ask for payment in advance, weekly or monthly. Prepayment turns your customers’ money into your working capital, cuts bad debt to zero, and makes customers more committed. A prepaid wallet makes this automatic: customers top up once and each meal is debited.