Frenchman Says Bonjour to $35,000/Month Foodie Hustle

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

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Frenchman says bonjour to $35,000 a month foodie hustle. Welcome friends, welcome to Side Hustle School. Today I have a story for you about a guy who relocates to Quebec, and then this continental creative brings seasonal flavor to an artisanal food retailing business. Pretty fun story. I don't believe in overnight success stories.

There's usually a lot of work involved in a successful project. There's often challenges or sometimes even failures along the way. So I always try to tell you like not only what was good, but also what were the obstacles that this person encountered. Today we're gonna look at this side hustle. It is a real business.

As I mentioned, more than $30,000, $35,000 in monthly sales, especially during the holiday season. Those numbers are based on the original episode several years ago. He's actually been going for a decade operated by someone in Quebec who still works a regular job. Just a reminder, side hustles can make a lot of money even while you're still working a regular job. The growth has been slow, steady and sustainable.

Often the best kind of growth. Much better than viable growth. It just kind of blows up, but it's not necessarily sustainable in the longterm. So excited to bring you this story. His name is Cedric Fontaine.

I'm gonna tell you the story and do a little bit of analysis. Hopefully give you something helpful and inspiring right after this quick break on behalf of our sponsor. [Music]

In many ways, Cedric Fontaine is a classic Frenchman, foie gras, cheese, bread, butter and a glass of red are never far away. He brought that devotion to gastronomy with him when he immigrated from France to Canada about 15 years ago to work as an e-commerce consultant. A friend warned him that he couldn't find his favorite French flavors in Quebec.

Cedric briefly considered the next flight home, but then took the warning as a challenge. If he couldn't find the tastes he missed, he'd map the province's best and build a business around them. He began a directory of artisanal producers and used it as the foundation for Terroir, Quebec, a side hustle focused on regional foods and the sense of place that shapes them. This was the perfect organizing idea because soil climate and season impart character to cheese, wine, coffee, chocolate, even tomatoes. Cedric launched Terroir, Quebec in 2005 with roughly 10 products.

The catalog grew to around 400. For the first five years, he warehoused everything in his basement, moving from a single order each month in the earliest days to roughly 30 orders, and then more as word spread. A self-described techie, Cedric coded his own e-commerce site. This was actually originally before WordPress, before Shopify, so he did it himself. For a few thousand dollars, he bought his initial stock, 12 units each of 10 hand-picked products.

Choosing them was straightforward because he knew his customer. He was the customer, at least the ideal customer. That ideal buyer cared about provenance and organics, preferred short ingredient lists, and paid for substance over fillers. Seasonality runs through both the catalog and demand. Summer emphasizes barbecue sauces, dressings, spices and jams, winter shifts to herbal teas, and comfort staples like foie gras and sea salt caramel.

Orders follow the same rhythm. Roughly 300 a month from January to September, then a surge of 800 per month from October to December. Cedric runs a tight inventory. He maintains a live list of every item in storage and critically every expiration date. Those lists drive merchandising.

Products approaching their dates get featured in email newsletters so cash can convert without waste. Now, early on, he dreamed of worldwide shipping, but then reality intervened. Postage on heavy jars and tins often exceeded the product value. Even within Canada, the differences in rates between provinces collided with thin margins. He began with self-fulfillment, boxes stacked in the basement, labels printed at night.

But once the daily volume hit 30 orders, the cracks showed. Food is tricky to ship. You've got hot summers, cold winters, glass. There were mishaps like spoilage, breakage, insulation that wasn't quite enough, followed by improvements and better systems. Today, he's got his packing protocols and carrier choices dialed in.

Now, what about the margins? Well, those profit margins are slimmer than in a lot of side hustle categories, but the model works because revenue cycles back into growth. You can increase the broader selection, have smarter advertising, make some more steady process improvements. And Cedric also pays himself modestly. He takes about 10% of monthly revenue as income.

So sometimes this can be a slow month where he's selling $15,000. He just earns about 1500. But then for the bigger months, he's earning $35,000 sometimes more. So his take home is a good bit more as well. The rest funds inventory, marketing and operations.

Speaking of operations, he keeps the loop simple. Listen to customers, expand carefully and let seasonality guide merchandising. New products are vetted for fit and logistics. A brilliant jam that explodes under pressure is not a good idea. Email remains a meaningful sales driver because it's where story meets scarcity.

He can talk about a spring cheese with a short window, a late summer spice blend or a limited run of maple butter. Shipping remains the biggest lever for profit. Heavy food will always be expensive to move, but Cedric's been experimenting with packaging tweaks, carrier mixes and zone strategies to squeeze cost without sacrificing reliability. He's also rebuilding the website to make a cleaner buying experience in hopes to widen the assortment beyond Quebec while keeping terroir at the center. This business began as one person's refusal to settle for bland.

It has become a seasonal machine, summer smoke and sweetness, winter richness and warmth. The basement operation matured into one that peaks at 800 orders a month with a catalog curated as much by climate as by taste. Cedric's bet was simple to serve a customer like himself, curious, picky, loyal to provenance and the business would follow. Nearly two decades on, it has. And with smarter shipping, a better site and a broader pantry on the horizon, there's more on the menu.

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Unlike a lot of other online businesses that we have featured over the years, this is the kind of project that comes with some risk and will take some time to succeed just because the costs are high. You're dealing with inventory and not just inventory, but inventory with expiration dates, which is why it's so important to track those specifically and individually. You have the complications of storage and shipping. So it's not easy. But the good news is Cedric clearly knows his why.

Like this isn't all about the money for him. It is a good side income, but he also seems kind of like a food ambassador or food evangelist of sorts. So I really do admire that passion and commitment. Inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. That's my encouragement for you today.

I hope you enjoyed the story. Perhaps it gets you thinking about something you could do, or perhaps you're like, this is not a business that I want to do. And I respect that as well. It's important to know yourself. We've got lots of other ideas coming up.

Tomorrow, we're gonna talk about reselling Lego. We'll go from artisanal food to reselling those packages all in a week's work. Thanks for being out there. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School.

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From the Onward Project.