Business Workshops

Three sessions.
Your real numbers.

The Monvarolario business workshop is a focused, three-session program for food business owners who want to understand what each dish actually costs to produce — and set prices that reflect that reality.

Workshop Structure

What happens in each session

Each session is a working meeting, not a lecture. You bring your dishes — we provide the tools, the framework, and the guidance.

1
Session 1 — Ingredient Cost Mapping
You arrive with a list of your main dishes and their ingredients. Using a digital scale, you weigh each component and calculate its cost per portion. Waste and trim are factored in. By the end of this session, you have a cost card for each dish showing exactly how much the raw materials cost per serving.
2
Session 2 — The Full Cost Picture
Ingredient cost is only part of the story. In this session you add: gas and fuel costs allocated per dish, disposable containers and packaging, napkins and condiments given away, and your own labor time. Many participants discover in this session that their true cost per dish is meaningfully higher than they thought.
3
Session 3 — Pricing Strategy
With a complete cost picture in hand, you work through how to build a sustainable price. You learn about markup, break-even, and how to think about your prices relative to your local market — without guessing. You leave with a pricing framework you can update yourself whenever costs change.
Food business owner filling out a handwritten cost card with ingredient weights and prices at a workshop table
What You Take Away

Leave with tools you built yourself

The most important thing you take from the workshop is not a workbook — it's the understanding of how to do this yourself. You build each tool during the sessions, using your own dishes and your own numbers.

Cost Card per Dish
A complete breakdown of every cost component for each dish you work on during the sessions.
True Cost per Portion
The total cost — ingredients, gas, packaging, labor — expressed as a single number per serving.
Pricing Framework
A simple, updatable method for setting prices that you can apply to new dishes or adjust when input costs change.
Workshop Details

Practical information about the program

Group Size

Sessions are kept to a small group format so that each participant receives individual attention during the costing exercises. This is a working session, not a classroom lecture.

Session Format

Three sessions, each covering a distinct stage of the costing and pricing process. Sessions are scheduled to accommodate the working hours of food business owners.

Location

Business workshops are held at our Xalapa venue: Plaza Caxa, Av. 20 de Noviembre 571, Local 3C, Xalapa, Veracruz. Community format available in other areas.

What to Bring

Your main dish recipes, recent ingredient purchase receipts, and your current menu prices. We provide the scale, the cost worksheets, and the methodology.

The Hidden Costs

What most food businesses forget to count

Ingredient cost is the starting point. These are the items that almost always go uncounted — until the workshop.

Gas & Fuel

Whether you use gas tanks or other fuel, the cost is real and it varies by dish based on cooking time and heat intensity. The workshop shows you how to allocate it accurately.

Disposables & Packaging

Styrofoam containers, plastic bags, paper plates, toothpicks — each one has a cost. Counted across hundreds of servings per week, they add up to a meaningful expense.

Salsa, Lime & Condiments

The salsa you give away, the limes on the table, the cilantro and onion on the side — these are ingredients with a cost. When given away without pricing, they reduce your margin.

Your Time

Prep time, cooking time, cleaning time — your labor has a value. The workshop includes a simple method for assigning a labor cost to each dish based on realistic time estimates.

Waste & Trim

Not all of what you buy becomes product. Vegetable trim, meat waste, and overcooked items represent real cost. Accurate costing accounts for your actual yield, not the theoretical weight.

Water & Utilities

Cleaning, cooking, and prep all use water and sometimes electricity. While smaller than gas costs, these are real operating expenses that belong in a complete cost structure.

Ready to calculate
your real costs?

Contact us to find out about upcoming workshop dates and how to reserve your place in a business session.

Contact Us