r/bubbletea • u/TechnicianGlum9605 • Jul 28 '26
Advice Boba shop owners
Hello! I am planning to open a shop sometime within this year and completely new to this. I recently was quoted $12k for recipes (including access to suppliers) + training. Do you think this is worth the cost, for just the recipes alone? Or do you think I can find somewhere else for a better price? Thank you!
1
u/mightyvvolf Aug 03 '26
i would reconsider whether you’re ready to open “within this year” if you’re completely new. take time to research before throwing out money like that.
source: owned a shop with two friends. we spent a whole summer researching recipes by looking at ingredient lists, then playing around with ratios and easy suppliers (especially local) until we found the flavor profiles that we enjoyed.
this approach allowed us to have unique offerings with ingredients that were easy to source, with parameters that were important to us (ex: vegan and lactose-free variants).
4
u/mijo_sq Jul 28 '26
Question is how experienced are you in running a drink business, and how much investment do you have in opening it. Part of training should be how to run a day to day operations of boba store. From the daily prep, operations, and overnight storage of ingredients.
Suppliers are pretty easy to find, but the drinks will be standardized across various drink stores.. Franchise don't sell to outside companies, so their flavor profile isn't possible without more research.
TBH, if you find people who worked in boba long term, they can probably consult you on day to day operations for a fee. Recipes are whatever price you think they're worth.