Let's take a peek under the hood.
On these figures the month leaves about $4,751 before you pay yourself, across roughly 121 of your own hours. Two things are still open: what a meal really costs to make, and what the delivery vehicle costs.
Local meal-prep · August 2026
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You're viewing: What matters now
How the month adds up
Money in, what it costs, what it leaves you.
- Money inConfirmed unchanged
~$9,418
per month · Illustrative
- Food and packagingNeeds review
− ~$3,767
per month · Assumption
- What the work leavesUpdated
~$5,651
per month · Illustrative
- Cost of being openConfirmed unchanged
− $900
per month · Supported
- Delivery vehicleNeeds review
− Unknown
per month · Unknown
- What the month leaves youUpdated
~$4,751
per month · Illustrative
- Your hoursNeeds review
~121 hrs
per month · Supported
Try a different set of numbers
Nothing here changes your business. It changes the picture, so you can see what the business responds to.
- 25
Households on a $80 package. You have about 25, up to ~30 at peak.
- $80
What one weekly package of 8 meals costs.
- $4
The number worth measuring first — everything else moves with it.
- 10
Single meals outside the weekly packages.
- 28 hrs
What you personally put in, alongside your job.
| Per month | As it stands | In this picture |
|---|---|---|
| Money in | $9,418 | $9,418 |
| What the work leaves | $5,651 | $5,651 |
| What the month leaves you | $4,751 | $4,751 |
| Your hours | 121 hrs | 121 hrs |
| Per hour of yours | $39.18 | $39.18 |
The month leaves $4,751 — $39.18 an hour across the 121 hours you put in. That sits at or above the $3,917 a month your job pays before tax. Delivery vehicle cost is not in this yet, and your own hours are not paid from it.
Something you chose on purpose
The 6 households you deliver to free
You have chosen to keep this accessible for older customers on fixed incomes. Our job is to understand what it takes and help you keep it, not to price it away.
- 6 older customers, the same $80 package, delivery not charged.
- One consolidated route of about 7 miles.
- About 2 hours of your week — roughly 8.7 hours a month.
- Those packages bring in ~$2,078 a month and leave about $1,247 after food and packaging.
- What the vehicle costs to run that route: Unknown.
The packages themselves carry their own food and packaging comfortably. What is not yet in the picture is the vehicle. Measuring one run — miles, fuel and time — is what turns this from a worry into a number you can hold.
How your money is organised
We learn this as we go. Any answer here is a workable answer.
How do you keep track of what comes in?
It tells us how often the money picture can be refreshed without extra work for you.
And what goes out?
Expenses are usually the harder half to see, and the one that changes the answer most.
How do business and personal money sit today?
Any answer works. It changes how we read the numbers, not whether we can.
What does the delivery run cost you to drive?
It is the one number missing from the monthly result, and it belongs to you rather than to us.
Would statements or receipts be easier to hand over than typing numbers?
If so, we can read them for you and keep this page current on its own.
What it would take to stand on this
This part is here because you told us the point of this business is to leave your job within about 12 months. It is shaped around your situation rather than a standard checklist.
For your transition we're planning against a 3–6 month reserve of essential expenses — a range we chose together, not a rule
- Replacing your job incomeIn reach
~$3,917 a month, gross
Your job pays about $47,000 a year before tax. The business currently leaves ~$4,751 a month before your time and before vehicle cost, so this is within reach on paper.
- Replacing what the job also coversOpen
Unknown
Health cover, paid time off and anything else the job carries. Worth listing before any leap; we have not put a figure on it.
- Room for a variable monthOpen
Unknown
The business has good months and quiet ones. How much variation you can absorb depends on your household, which you have not shared yet.
- Reserve of essential expensesOpen
3–6 months — amount Unknown
We would rather ask you what your essential monthly expenses are than invent a figure.
What we're keeping an eye on
- What the delivery vehicle costs — the one number here still unknown.
- Whether $4 a meal holds once one week of shopping is measured.
- Whether the 6 free deliveries stay on one route as word spreads.
- How your business and personal money are organised — we'll follow your lead on that.
Nothing here needs an answer today. We raise them when they start to matter.
Help is always a click away — from us, or from a person.