@caity
Not to be a party pooper (ok...I'm a party pooper), but you'll need to consider sustainability and repeatability of sales.

B2C - Business to Consumer Sales
Assuming a single pesto connoisseur purchases 1-2 jars of pesto. When will they purchase the next jar?

B2B - Business to Business Sales
Restaurants and wholesalers (who sources to hotels and restaurants and also MAY have both national and international abilities) are significantly higher volume. Can you handle the volume.

Depends on whether you're out to make hit and run sales or develop a long-term sustainable business.

Finally - there's the health and safety issue. Improperly canned and bottled foods can be a source of botulism, salmonella, and a plethora of other serious bacterial infections.

You'll not only have to address the organic nature of your product - but also your compliance with exemplary food and safety standards. A single bad batch can crush your business and expose you to civil and criminal penalties if anyone is (or claims to be) injured by your products(s).

An unscrupulous buyer could intentionally taint your products and use that to cause you an endless supply of heart-rending troubles beginning with extortion.

We don't always like to look at the dark sides of life - but whether you look or not - they're out there.

Suggest you start with a pilot amongst the expat population. Hold a taste test at some popular venue or food fair - secure pre-orders to cover your actual costs of ingredients purchase, then make your deliveries under the food and safety radar via personal or social networking (wechat/weixin/qq).

China's food and safety laws, guidelines, and ENFORCEMENT are notoriously lax, inefficient, and generally lack a cohesive architecture - more like spaghetti noodles - but if you become a social nuisance - you should expect to be painfully and publicly crucified as an example.

does any business ever have any assurance when they're going to sell the next product?

also, you plant food safety fears in this poor aspiring entrepreneur's mind without really providing information how to protect from this problem. surely, other food businesses are face the same risks? why not enlighten us on how they manage it?

We would go for the more traditional Italian flavors but probably not the others. Please post if you get it up and running!

great bravo!
The main ingridient in pesto is BASILICO

can u find it in Ku? fresh ??
and is press not cut ! a lot of work! !!
BUT IF IT IS GGOODD 100Y FOR 2 PLATES OF SPAGETTI AL PESTO CAN GO

GOOD LUCK

@mag
Food chain hygiene is the responsibility of the producer, NOT the consumer and general public.

It is the responsibility of the producer to follow both legal rules and internationally recognized best practices. As a private unlicensed purveyor - the entrepreneur should assure the general public of their sanitary and hygienic processes. Just being green or allegedly organic is insufficient.

Each respective food product comes with it's own line of best or mandated practices. I'm neither an expert nor a consultant in this area - but I have basic knowledge of food handling - hence the issue of buying privately prepared goods.

Simple idiotic issues such as roach or rat droppings etc ad infinitum can cause a myriad of health problems if the producer isn't rigorously sanitary and conscientious - something probably severely lacking in China.

once it goes beyond the producer it is not longer his respolsibiltu.

@laotou,

if you were opening such a small-scale food startup business, what measures would you take to ensure that:
1 - the food is safe to a certain standard. who defines and enforces food safety standards?
2 - no one can accuse you of the food being unsafe for extortion purposes (which if i recall was the point you made in a previous post?)

@mag
I wouldn't open a small-scale food startup business - not my "thing".

Pesto as I see it delivered here is a canned (jarred/bottled) perishable good. I'd probably start with a search on best industry practices and for the USA - mandated industry standards for such goods and try to implement into a hobby-sized business.

This includes sanitization and storage of the storage media, the ingredients, and the food handlers, then publish your processes on your website as compliant or generally compliant with the various standards.

I'd treat the ingredients as kosher or halal - meaning separate refrigeration or at the very least - separate dedicated shelves (from my vague knowledge of such things).

I'd definitely include steam cleaning and heated drying of the storage/delivery containers such as jars/bottles/lids.

I'd also definitely go talk to Salvadors et al to see what their processes are for their perishable consumer goods.

I'd probably follow-on with a search for how US pseudo-organic stores (Trader Joes, et al) source their small business perishables - so you'd be ready to also do B2B (biz-to-biz) sales (e.g. to the various expat restaurants), as a secondary source of steadier revenue.

I would venture most small under the radar home businesses are too lazy or indifferent to put the time and effort into such onerous research, documentation, and procedural artifact.

For example - how would one determine the expiration date on such a product, shelf life, etc...but this is probably way beyond the scope of the original author's intent.

seems a bit complicated. ok, thanks.

hi, just curious if you got your food biz up and running?! If so, how can I contact you? I have a Christmas dinner to attend this week and would love to bring some fresh sauces as a gift. I think the host would love it! Thanks!