As an entrepreneur who started a salsa business based on a family recipe during the COVID-19 pandemic, I depend on a shared kitchen for my business. I could never have started it without having access to it, and that’s true for countless entrepreneurs. Yet there is a nationwide shortage of shared food facilities. Meeting this need is essential to the growth of new businesses, and local governments have a major role to play.
The reason shared food facilities are so important is because food-related businesses are among the most accessible to aspiring entrepreneurs. The beauty of food is that it reflects culture and heritage, and everyone has culture and heritage to contribute.
I never imagined my business would be based on a recipe that was in my mother’s kitchen, but when the pandemic shut down my work, I turned to the recipe box. My family has moved over the decades from Mexico to Alaska and New Mexico, and our salsa recipe reflects all of that heritage, with a unique blend of related flavors.
Luckily, I live in Albuquerque, where there are several shared kitchens, and I was able to access them affordably. But the waiting list for access to a shared kitchen in Albuquerque can now reach 18 months. This is a bottleneck for entrepreneurship. Advancing entrepreneurship is crucial, as small businesses create most new jobs in America.
And many Americans want to start their own businesses. A survey recently carried out to Right to start, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for entrepreneurship as a civic priority, found that 43% of American voters have thought about starting a new business, but only half have tried it. Voters of color are particularly entrepreneurial: 54% of black voters and 50% of Hispanic voters say they have thought about starting a business, compared to 40% of white voters.
Nationally, in 2019, there were just over 600 shared-use food facilities nationwide, according to a survey of the kitchen incubator industry. That may sound like a lot, but only a little more than half of those facilities were in urban areas where nearly 128 million Americans live. That means there wasn’t even a single common kitchen in most of the 780 U.S. cities with populations of 50,000 or more. Additionally, 75% of shared kitchens had fewer than 30 users and 52% could only accommodate four at a time.
Yet shared kitchens, as a community priority, are not particularly expensive. Fifty-seven percent of those surveyed by the industry had an operating budget of less than $100,000. They are an asset that most communities can afford to prioritize, especially given their potential to rejuvenate downtown commercial districts, local economies and tax bases. When operators of shared dining facilities were asked why users left their facilities, 42 percent cited moving to a physical location. This is a win for any community looking to fill vacant storefronts.
So what can cities do to prioritize shared food facilities?
First, assess the landscape. Where are the nearest public catering facilities and how many are there? What proportion of the population and what parts of the community do they serve? Do they have waiting lists and, if so, how long? Is the rent affordable for aspiring entrepreneurs?
Second, encourage the growth of shared food facilities. They can be for-profit (as was the case for 52% of those surveyed) or non-profit. There are therefore two dynamic paths to follow. Nonprofit facilities may be promoted by philanthropic interests; for-profit companies could respond better to tax incentives. In either case, zoning changes may be necessary to encourage the opening of facilities in priority locations.
Third, promote shared food facilities as a civic asset. Massachusetts, for example, lists the state’s 20 shared-use kitchen spaces, providing links to their websites and contact details. The more the facilities are promoted, the more they will be known to aspiring entrepreneurs.
At a time when so many Americans want to start a business and U.S. job growth depends on it, it is critical that we prioritize shared food facilities. Every community should provide them with easy access and benefit economically from a taste of its own culture and heritage.
Edgar Solis is the founder and CEO of Alma Salsa and a defender of Right to start in New Mexico.
GoverningOpinion columns reflect the opinions of their authors and not necessarily those of GoverningThe editors or management of .
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