About the Venture Kitchen

The Venture Kitchen is a fully licensed commercial kitchen startup, located in the MSU Union. This shared space is designed for MSU students seeking to launch creative business ventures that require a commercial kitchen space. Students have access to one-on-one business coaching, MDARD food licensing support, and networking opportunities.

At its core, the Venture Kitchen is a co-curricular, experiential learning space where students can explore, innovate, and create.
The goal of the Venture Kitchen is to support students as they:

• Develop entrepreneurship skills through curiosity-based experimentation and problem-solving.
• Develop networking skills through opportunity exploration.
• Participate in sustainable business practices by developing stewardship of resources.
• Effectively collaborate in a small business team that demonstrates accountability, responsibility, and ownership.

THE STORY

Prior to the founding of the Venture Kitchen, MSU students were utilizing a mobile food processing unit, fondly called the Raspberry Jammer, which was located at the Student Organic Farm south of campus. The mobile unit allowed students to explore entrepreneurship through developing value-added agricultural products with a sustainability story and a true farm-to-consumer ethic. The Raspberry Jammer exposed a true need for a space that students could collaborate and innovate in a real-world setting. Land Grant Goods and other student ventures quickly outgrew the space, which motivated the search for an on-campus commercial kitchen.

In 2016, RISE and Land Grant Goods, an agriculture business founded and managed by MSU students, launched a commercial kitchen food truck as a space to produce their tea, honey, jam and packaging. The Venture Kitchen is an expansion of the truck to further support and encourage student food-based innovation and businesses.

The Venture Kitchen was established in July 2020 to provide student entrepreneurs with a functional space that offered undergraduates with high-impact learning experiences.