Story: Vendor Who Cleaned Up During Slow Season

Lauren Twitchell
Dec 3, 2025
3 min read

Every food vendor knows the slow season can be nerve-wracking.You’re used to long weekends, fast cash, and constant motion—then suddenly, the calendar is quiet.

But for one Central Florida food vendor, that “quiet” winter turned into the most productive season her business ever had.

She didn’t open new locations.

She didn’t launch a new product.

She simply cleaned up her books.

And what she discovered changed everything about how she ran her business.

1. Meet Maria: The Market Vendor Who Was Always Moving

Maria owns a small empanada booth that pops up at farmers markets, art fairs, and weekend festivals across Lake and Orange County.

She’s a pro at food prep, customer service, and event logistics—but not at bookkeeping.

Like most vendors, she tracked income and expenses when she had time. Which meant some receipts got stuffed in aprons, some in glove boxes, and the rest were just “somewhere.”

She always figured:

“I’ll sort it all out at tax time.”

But when her 1099-K forms arrived, her numbers didn’t make sense.

Her Square report showed $28,000 in sales, but her bank deposits only showed $25,000.

That $3,000 gap was about to make tax time stressful—until she decided to finally do something different.

2. The Winter Break That Changed Everything

Maria decided to take the winter off from events to focus on her business’s foundation.

She reached out to Zero Fluff Books for a Cleanup Service. Together, we built a simple goal:

Get the books caught up, reconciled, and accurate before the next market season.

It took just two weeks.

But those two weeks completely changed how she saw her business.

3. What We Found

Once we pulled her Square reports, bank statements, and commissary invoices, the picture got clear fast.

Here’s what we discovered:

Square processing fees weren’t being tracked as expenses.
Refunds and cancellations were recorded as full sales.
Booth fees were buried under “supplies.”
Some deposits were combined (two-day events) and never itemized.

When we reconciled everything, Maria’s true profit was $5,200 higher than she thought.

4. The Power of Categorizing by Event

We set Maria up with a simple Excel-based Event Tracker.

Each row represented a market, with columns for:

Booth fee
Supplies
Travel
Commissary time
Sales
Net profit

Within a week, she started seeing clear patterns.

Her Saturday market in Mount Dora brought in more income, but after travel and booth fees, her weekday farmers market was actually more profitable.

That insight alone helped her cut down on travel—and add over $1,000 to her bottom line the next month.

5. The IRS Perspective

When I worked for the IRS, I saw hundreds of vendors like Maria—good, hard-working people who just didn’t have systems.

But here’s the truth:

Clean records don’t just help at tax time. They protect you.

Per IRM 4.10.4.3.3, examiners reviewing small cash businesses are trained to look for missing deposits and mismatched expense totals.

When your books are clean and reconciled, you show consistency, credibility, and proof that your business operates legitimately.

That’s what turns an audit into a five-minute check instead of a five-month ordeal.

6. The Unexpected Benefit

After her cleanup, Maria didn’t just feel organized—she felt in control.

She knew her break-even point.

She could see exactly what each event was worth.

And she started planning her 2026 season with confidence instead of stress.

Her comment during our final review call stuck with me:

“I thought I needed more events to make more money.Turns out, I just needed better bookkeeping.”

7. How to Follow Maria’s Lead

You don’t have to overhaul your business to get the same results.

Start with three simple steps:

✅ Reconcile your last three months of sales and deposits.

✅ Track your next event in a separate Excel tab.

✅ Label every receipt by event and date.

It’s not glamorous—but it’s how you find your real profit.

8. Need Help Cleaning Up?

If you’d rather hand it off, we can help.

Our Cleanup Packages are built for food vendors, festival sellers, and mobile businesses who want to start the next season with clean books and confidence.

All services are flat-rate, audit-informed, and done virtually.

👉 Explore Cleanup Packages here

Maria didn’t fix her business by working harder—she fixed it by getting organized.

When you understand your numbers, you finally understand your business.

Winter is your window.

Use it like Maria did—and watch what happens next season.