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KitchenCalc: Kitchen Cost Calculator SaaS

Status: Planned Target Market: Small food businesses (restaurants, caterers, meal prep, food trucks) Estimated MVP: 4-6 weeks Revenue Model: $19-99/mo subscription tiers

Executive Summary

Transform RMS from a personal recipe manager into a B2B SaaS for small food businesses with recipe costing, menu margin analysis, and meal planning.

Problem: Enterprise kitchen management (MarketMan, BlueCart) starts at $300+/mo. Most small operations use error-prone spreadsheets.

Solution: Simple, affordable recipe costing for businesses doing $50K-$500K/year in food costs.

Target Segments (Priority Order)

Segment Size Pain Point Willingness to Pay
Meal Prep Services Growing fast Scaling recipes, cost consistency High ($50-100/mo)
Catering Companies ~100K US Per-event costing, client quotes High ($50-150/mo)
Food Trucks ~35K US Menu optimization, tight margins Medium ($20-50/mo)
Small Restaurants ~600K US Food cost %, waste tracking Medium ($30-100/mo)

Feature Roadmap

Phase 1: MVP (Weeks 1-4)

  • Ingredient price management (manual entry + price history)
  • Recipe cost calculation (automatic from ingredients)
  • Recipe scaling (adjust servings, recalculate costs)
  • Cost per serving / cost per batch display
  • Menu builder with margin calculator
  • Basic reporting (food cost %, top expensive recipes)
  • Multi-user business accounts (owner + staff roles)
  • Authentik SSO

Phase 2: Growth (Weeks 5-8)

  • Meal planning calendar (drag-drop recipes to dates)
  • Prep list generation (aggregate ingredients across planned meals)
  • Shopping list export (PDF, email, print)
  • Supplier price import (CSV upload)
  • Recipe duplication & versioning
  • Cost alerts (ingredient price changes > X%)
  • Mobile-responsive prep view

Phase 3: Scale (Weeks 9-12)

  • Multi-location support
  • Inventory tracking (stock levels, waste logging)
  • Purchase order generation
  • API integrations (QuickBooks, Square, Toast)
  • White-label option
  • Advanced analytics (trends, seasonality, forecasting)

Technical Architecture

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                         K8s Cluster                                 │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  ┌────────────────┐  ┌────────────────┐  ┌────────────────┐        │
│  │  KitchenCalc   │  │  Marketing     │  │  Background    │        │
│  │  App (Next.js) │  │  Site (Next.js)│  │  Workers       │        │
│  └───────┬────────┘  └───────┬────────┘  └───────┬────────┘        │
│          └─────────┬─────────┴─────────┬─────────┘                  │
│                    ▼                   ▼                            │
│         ┌──────────────────────────────────────────┐               │
│         │      Supabase (schema: kitchen_calc)     │               │
│         └──────────────────────────────────────────┘               │
│                              │                                      │
│         ┌────────────────────┴─────────────────────┐               │
│         │                Authentik                  │               │
│         └──────────────────────────────────────────┘               │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                               │
              ┌────────────────┴───────────────┐
              │        External Services       │
              │  Stripe, Resend, Sentry        │
              └────────────────────────────────┘

Database Schema (Key Tables)

  • businesses - Multi-tenant accounts with subscription info
  • business_members - Team members with roles (owner/manager/staff)
  • ingredients - With purchase pricing and unit conversions
  • ingredient_price_history - Price trending
  • recipes - With calculated costs and margins
  • recipe_ingredients - Junction with line costs
  • menus / menu_items - Menu builder with pricing
  • meal_plans / planned_meals - Calendar planning
  • shopping_lists / shopping_list_items - Generated lists

Pricing Tiers

Tier Price Recipes Team Features
Trial Free (14 days) 10 1 Full access
Starter $19/mo 50 2 Costing, menus
Pro $49/mo Unlimited 5 + Meal planning, shopping lists, reports
Enterprise $99/mo Unlimited Unlimited + Multi-location, API, white-label

Code Reuse from RMS

Component Reuse Notes
Recipe model 80% Add costing fields
Ingredient model 60% Add pricing, units
Recipe steps 100% Direct copy
AI generation 50% Optional feature
UI components 90% shadcn components

Go-to-Market

  1. Friends & family beta (5-10 businesses)
  2. Soft launch on Reddit (r/KitchenConfidential, r/foodtrucks)
  3. Product Hunt launch
  4. Content marketing (food cost guides, margin calculators)

Key Metrics: - Trial → Paid conversion (target: 15%) - Monthly churn (target: <5%) - Recipes per business (engagement)

Next Steps to Begin

cd /root/projects
npx create-next-app@latest kitchen-calc --typescript --tailwind --app --no-src-dir --eslint --import-alias '@/*' --no-turbopack
/root/tower-fleet/scripts/scaffold-nextjs.sh /root/projects/kitchen-calc kitchen_calc

Then: Database schema → Authentik auth → Ingredient management → Recipe costing

Created: 2025-12-16 Last Updated: 2025-12-16