How to Make Money Selling Homemade Root Beer
If you have ever tasted homemade root beer; you know its delicious. But is it possible that brewing some homemade root beer a million dollar business idea? Well, that’s a big MAYBE. But it certainly worked for A&W, Mug Root Beer, and Hires (just to name a few).
For example, A&W began in 1919 when Roy Allen set up a roadside stand in Lodi, CA and sold his home made root beer to returning WWI soldiers and their families. People loved it so much, that he decided to take on a partner (Frank Right, hence the A&W) and opened their first permanent root beer stand. By 1933 they already had over 170 outlets franchised.
So if you want to make millions in the root beer business, the key to success is great taste, marketing, and a solid strategy.
First, and most importantly, you have to know how to make Root Beer! It is not the purpose of this article to go into all the details about how to make Root Beer. However, there are 2 ways: from extract or from scratch. Doing it from scratch will give you much more flexibility in taste; and therefore the ability to create a more unique product. Which in turn will help you create a more unique brand.
There are lots of references online about how to make root beer; here is one: http://www.greydragon.org/library/brewing_root_beer.html
However, before you go off experiementing with tastes and fancy ingredients, you need to determine if there is a market for Root Beer. Can you make money with this business?
Yes, there is a huge soft drink market. Coca-cola, Pepsi, A&W, Dr. Pepper, etc; they do billions of dollars of business each year. However, if you go out trying to steal business from Coca-cola or Pepsi, you are going to get crushed! These are giants that understand the market better than you do.
So, there IS a market; however, where can you position yourself to make some money? That is the whole crux of the matter. If you can position yourself correctly in the soft drink industry, you just might be able to carve out a profitable niche for yourself.
So, what sort of positions or strategies could there be in this industry? Well, since you are a small time operator, you need to have a quality product. I wouldn’t recommend trying to be a low cost leader out of the gate. A&W produces root beer by the millions of gallons and therefore has some serious economies of scale that you will not be able to achieve.
So, you need a unique taste, unique look, feel, approach, packaging, or some combination of those. One possible and most likely to succeed strategy is to start in a local niche.
Perfect your product and then start taking it around to local restaurants or market places. Because you are local, you have a story, and business owners just might be willing to give you a chance. So, start local, and then expand from there.
What sort of investment is necessary to get started? Well, the actual root beer creation is next to nothing. It may take a lot of time and effort to create the perfect product. But the ingrediants (sugar, water, etc.) are all very inexpensive. You will also be able to do all of your own bottling when you get started.
So, this is a perfect home-based business, that you can start very small, and grow at your own pace. People will always want tasty root beer to drink, so go create a unique product are start selling!
Leave a comment and let me know your opinion on this business idea!
I love root beer. Is bottling at home really an option? Has anyone done this? Just wondering.
Its an option on a small scale level, Ben. Get a funnel, pour the delicious root beer into a bottle, and you’re done. Its very time consuming. So, once you get bigger, you will certainly have to hire a bottling company.
Some people think that they are way too smart. They think their comments are wonders of the world! Dudes don’t be so self-confident.