Clean to Bare Metal, on Schedule, With Proof: The Complete Business Plan for a Kitchen Exhaust Cleaning Company, Presented to Its Lender
[Student Name]
University of Phoenix
BUS/475: Integrated Business Topics
Week 5 Assignment
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The company, the metro area and all figures are a composite written for a model presentation.
Slide 1: The Request
A $100,000, seven-year SBA 7(a) loan to open a kitchen exhaust cleaning company.
Founder's equity: $40,000. Total start-up: $140,000.
Repayment: about $1,660 a month from Year 1 cash flow.
Speaker notes
Good afternoon. I am asking for a $100,000 loan, backed by the SBA's 7(a) guarantee, to buy a cleaning rig and open a company that cleans commercial kitchen exhaust systems. I am putting in $40,000 of my own savings. By the end of this presentation, I will show you why restaurants must buy this service, why they will buy it from us and how the loan will be repaid from the first year's cash flow.
Slide 2: The Problem We Solve
Grease builds up in hoods, ducts and rooftop fans.
Cooking equipment is involved in about three in five restaurant fires.
The fire code requires cleaning on a schedule, by cooking volume.
Speaker notes
Every kitchen that fries or grills sends grease into its exhaust system, where it condenses and becomes fuel. The National Fire Protection Association reports that cooking equipment plays a part in roughly 60% of fires in restaurants and bars (Campbell, 2017). NFPA 96 requires hoods and ducts to be inspected and cleaned on a schedule set by the kind and volume of cooking, from monthly for solid-fuel kitchens to once a year for low-volume ones (National Fire Protection Association [NFPA], 2024). Demand for this service is not a matter of taste; the fire marshal and the insurer create it.
Slide 3: The Company
Mission: keep commercial kitchens safe from grease fires with complete, scheduled, documented cleaning.
Overnight service; photo report after every visit; dated label on every hood.
Founder: seven years as a hood cleaning technician and crew lead.
Speaker notes
We clean hoods, ducts and fans overnight, so kitchens never close. After every job, the customer receives before and after photographs of each access point, and the label on the hood records exactly what was cleaned. I spent seven years doing this work for a fire-protection contractor, and I know many of the kitchen managers in this area personally.
Slide 4: The Market
About 2,400 commercial kitchens in the metro area.
About 6,000 required cleanings a year, roughly $2.5 million.
First targets: high-volume restaurants and restaurant groups.
Speaker notes
Using county food-service permits and the fire code's frequencies, we estimate about 6,000 required cleanings a year in the metro area. At an average price of $420, that is a local market of roughly $2.5 million before add-on services. We need about 16% of those cleanings to reach our Year 3 goal. Our first customers will be high-volume kitchens on a quarterly schedule, plus restaurant groups that want one vendor for all their locations.
Slide 5: How We Win
90 accounts are losing their current vendor, which is leaving the business.
We sell a managed program, not a single cleaning.
We compete on completeness and proof, not price.
Speaker notes
Our SWOT analysis pointed to one clear opening. My former employer is dropping hood cleaning, which leaves roughly 90 kitchens without a provider; we will contact every one in the first two months. Against franchise competitors, we offer the same completeness with more personal service and better reports. Against low-price operators, our photos show what a complete cleaning looks like. Customers commit to a year's program, and we book every visit for them.
Slide 6: Operations and Capacity
One two-person crew: two kitchens a night, about 500 cleanings a year.
Year 1 goal: 420 cleanings, 84% of capacity.
Second rig and crew in Year 2; both near full by Year 3.
Speaker notes
Most kitchens take us three to four hours. We lock out the equipment, wrap the cooking line, degrease, scrape and wash to bare metal, capture all wastewater for licensed disposal, then photograph and label. One crew can do about 500 cleanings a year, so our first-year goal of 420 leaves room for emergency calls. Every photo report is reviewed before it is sent, and one job in ten is checked in person.
Slide 7: The Numbers
Revenue: $200,000, $350,000, $500,000 in Years 1 to 3.
Income before taxes: $19,268, $1,877, $65,401.
Year 1 break-even: 374 cleanings, an 11% margin of safety.
Speaker notes
Every projection is built from cleanings and price per cleaning. Year 1 earns about $19,300. Year 2 is close to break-even because the second rig, crew and loan all start before the new crew's customers are fully won. Year 3 earns about $65,400 with both crews near capacity. Cash never falls below the start-up reserve, and it reaches about $118,500 by the end of Year 3. The loan payment of about $19,900 a year is covered in Year 1 by income plus depreciation of about $36,300.
Slide 8: Risks and How We Manage Them
Fire claims: photo records, honest labels, completed-work liability coverage.
Crew safety: fall protection, two-person crews, chemical training.
Growth risk: add the second rig only when the first crew passes 90% of capacity.
Speaker notes
The risk that matters most to you is the second rig. If the first crew is not running above 90% of capacity for three months, we will delay the second rig rather than borrow for it early. Our other serious risks are a fire claim and a crew injury, and we manage both through documentation, insurance and strict safety practice. Following new Swedish ventures from their start, Delmar and Shane (2003) found that writing a plan early lowered the chance that a venture would be disbanded, which is one reason this plan exists in writing.
Slide 9: Our Ethics Rule and How We Measure Success
A label goes only on what was cleaned; anything missed is written down.
No commissions on add-on sales.
Monthly scorecard: renewals of at least 85%, on-time cleanings of at least 98%, cash reserve of at least $30,000.
Speaker notes
Our reputation rests on the label. Any stretch of duct we could not get to is named on the label and in the report, and no technician is penalized for the time that takes. We track a balanced scorecard every month across financial, customer, process and learning measures, because a scorecard ties daily work to the strategy that produces the results (Kaplan & Norton, 2001). If renewals or on-time cleanings slip, we will know within a month.
Slide 10: The Request, Again
$100,000 SBA 7(a) loan, seven years.
Repaid from Year 1 operating cash flow.
Security: the rig, the founder's equity and a personal guarantee.
Speaker notes
To close, the fire code guarantees that restaurants in this area need our service, 90 accounts are ready to switch, one crew can deliver the first year's work and the first year's cash flow covers the loan. I am asking you to fund the rig that starts it. Thank you, and I welcome your questions.
References
Campbell, R. (2017). Structure fires in eating and drinking establishments. National Fire Protection Association.
Delmar, F., & Shane, S. (2003). Does business planning facilitate the development of new ventures? Strategic Management Journal, 24(12), 1165-1185. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.349
Kaplan, R. S., & Norton, D. P. (2001). Transforming the balanced scorecard from performance measurement to strategic management: Part I. Accounting Horizons, 15(1), 87-104. https://doi.org/10.2308/acch.2001.15.1.87
National Fire Protection Association. (2024). NFPA 96: Standard for ventilation control and fire protection of commercial cooking operations (2024 ed.).
How this BUS 475 Week 5 example is structured
The BUS/475 shelf page describes Week 5 as assembling the full plan and a presentation, often with a learning team. The deck is ordered the way a lender reads a plan: the request first, then the reason the business exists, the evidence that customers will buy, the ability to deliver, the numbers and the risks. Each slide carries one idea, and the speaker notes supply the explanation and the sources, drawing on the work of the four earlier weeks. Students search this week as BUS 475 Week 5, BUS475 Wk 5 or BUS/475 Wk 5; all three are the same assignment.
BUS/475 Week 5 questions, answered
What does BUS/475 Week 5 usually ask for?
The BUS/475 shelf describes Week 5 as assembling the full plan and a presentation, often with a learning team. Many sections ask students to integrate the earlier parts of a strategic or business plan into one final document and present it with slides and speaker notes.
How should a business plan presentation be ordered?
Start with what you are asking for and why the business exists, then show the market, the strategy, operations, the financial projections and the risks, and close by repeating the request. Decision makers want to know early what they are being asked to approve.
How much detail belongs on each slide?
Very little. Three or four short lines per slide, with the numbers the audience must remember. The explanation, the assumptions and the sources belong in the speaker notes and in the written plan behind the deck.
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