A shared kitchen, also known as a “commissary kitchen” or “incubator kitchen,” is a commercially-licensed space available for food entrepreneurs, bakers, caterers, food trucks and other culinary licensed professionals to rent to create their products, COhatch’s Growth Manager Tania Lehotay said.
“Entrepreneurism is at an all time high and in the spirit of embracing that culture, food entrepreneurs and makers have the ability to come in, rent a space - without the cost of investing into an expensive build out,” Lehotay said. “This allows for makers to have the flexibility of creating amazing goods for consumers without the overhead.”
SpringFORWARD, a nonprofit with the mission of boosting investment in downtown Springfield, purchased the historic “Myers Market” property in 2018 from the city of Springfield. The agency has been collaborating with COhatch to open a year-round artisan’s marketplace, shared kitchen, food hall, and co-working, lifestyle and event space for local entrepreneurs, businesses and individuals.
COhatch is a Columbus-based company that rents space out for individuals and businesses to use for offices or events. Other COhatch locations in Fairborn and Worthington are already operating and utilizing shared kitchens.
RELATED: Springfield food truck, Bubby’s Chicken & Waffles, moves indoors to a shared kitchen
The price for a licensed food maker to use the COhatch shared kitchen is still in development and will be announced soon, Lehotay said.
Licensed food makers interested in renting the space should contact Nancy Williams by email, nancy@cohatch.com, for more information.
The COhatch shared kitchen is part of The Market section of the building and is expected to open a few weeks after the shared office and co-working portion of the building opens in January.
The Bushnell Building shared kitchen is open and already has two tenants; Bubby’s Chicken & Waffles and J&J’s Phat Head Foods.
Jim Lagos, owner of the Bushnell Building, said that before the shared kitchen concept, several different restaurants were using the kitchen space.
RELATED: New Springfield restaurant offers curbside service, delivery through a shared kitchen
“Rather than see it sit idly by, we thought we could help various small businesses to get established,” Lagos said. “We figure the kitchen is an asset that could be used for small businesses to start up in terms of anything to do with food. That could be in terms of cooking and carry out food or theoretically processing food.”
The price of the Bushnell Building shared kitchen is $10 per hour and licensed food makers should contact Lagos by phone, 937-323-5555, for more information.
Both shared kitchens require the entrepreneur to have licensing to operate in the kitchen. If the entrepreneur does not, both will help point the person in the right direction.
Lagos said, “It’s sort of an evolving concept.” He added, “small businesses create most of the new jobs in the economy and that has been true for decades.”
About the Author