Posts Tagged ‘Shop’

Most of what I am going to talk about here is geared towards the new coffee shop. However, it can be utilized and directed towards an established shop. When I wrote my business plan, I made sure I had marketing covered from many angles because most traditional forms of marketing do not work in the specialty coffee business. When opening your coffee shop, you should know what types of advertising and marketing are actually worth your money.

Outside of your regulars, coffee is an impulse buy because the customer saw your sign. Aside from your regulars, most folks do not set out to ‘go to the coffee shop’ like they would to a restaurant (unless you ask them to so more on this later). You need a steady stream of customers outside of your normal morning commute business.

The morning commuters are your bread and butter, the rest helps fill in the revenue holes. These are your impulse buyers. They are going to come to you mainly via your sign outside, so instead of sending out 10,000 post cards to your neighborhood residents, spend that money on a premium location, visible sign and branding your image. You’ll be glad you did:

As far as your signage, get one that is AS BIG AS POSSIBLE. That is, as allowable by your city ordinance and landlord, without being tacky! The bigger the sign is, the more visible it is.

By branding your image, you are identifying your existence within your community. Be sure you have a unique logo. If you cannot design it, get one custom made by a professional! I have seen a lot of cheap looking logos that do not help the image.

Another step in branding your image is to secure your shop’s name on the world wide web by registering the domain name. Try to get all the domain tags: .com, .net, .org, etc. This is for email, and your website. You will be glad you did because it gives you a more professional image. Remember, the more common your business name is, the more difficult getting it registered online is going to be because the name may be taken.

As for your website, get one! If you can do this on your own, more power to you here too. I know just enough to be dangerous but you can get a nice website, even with online sales capabilities done economically. Check around locally, I bet there are a few web gurus in your area.

Here is where you have the chance to have every customer take your name with them when they leave allowing others to see it. Whether you have sleeves custom printed or you use stickers and put one on each cup or protective sleeve, they are all part of your branding. Be sure the design is clear and defines your shop well. The same goes for stamps. You can have a rubber stamp made to stamp your whole bean coffee bags with. Note that the brown Kraft paper bags are what you’d need for this. If you use the foil bags, your stickers will work well for this too.

Press releases are an inexpensive way to tell the world what you are doing. A carefully crafted press release sent to the right person at the right news outlet can be the best form of advertising for you. Just be sure that whomever is on the press release as the contact person is actually available to be contacted.

Another great form of marketing is your use of tee shirts, caps and other wearable’s. These are walking billboards for you courtesy of the folks that buy them. You can give them away if you want, it’s all good advertising. Yes, they are expensive but I consider this great advertising and an expense under that category. Better, yes if you can make up the cost on them. But put this cost into your advertising budget. See if you can get them locally, if not there are several reputable companies on the internet. You will pay about .00 each in the end, but again the investment is very well worth it.

Where would we be without business cards? Think about it: how many people have you run into that do not have a business card for whatever it is they do for a living? Not many that I can remember. This is your time to tell everyone you meet that you are in the coffee business. Everyone you meet should get one of these and a few to spare. Do not be shy about handing them out!

Menus are a great example of simple marketing. These are the take out type so try to keep it simple. Under four pages, printed on an 8.5”x11” sheet of BRIGHT colored paper and folded in half is best. You can leave them at area businesses if they allow it. You can also put them on your counter by the checkout and anywhere else your customers will see and take them. You can have them copied at any copy place, or see if you can have a local copy shop do them. They should cost about .10-.15 cents each. All you need is a place to make them on a copy machine. Menus printed on a printing press will be more expensive in most cases.

Support materials are also a good way to advertise your products. You can usually get POS materials FREE from any supplier you are using. This goes for tent cards to put on your counter to full color posters to hang in your windows. Check with your distributor. If they do not keep these kinds of materials on hand, a call to the manufacturer can usually get them in your hands relatively quickly.

Vinyl lettering on your vehicle is another form of advertising, and another type of moving billboard. There are several places online that will allow you to use a particular vehicle template to design your lettering. Again, check around locally for better service and pricing. I had vehicle lettering made for my SUV: rear window and both rear side windows or under 0.00. Your vehicle will essentially become a moving billboard.

Vinyl lettering can be gotten for your store windows too, which will be similar to your vehicle lettering. Check with the same source.

Word of mouth is an excellent source of marketing. Customers can be your biggest and best marketing source for you. It can also backfire on you if you tick someone off or if a customer ends up having a bad experience at your shop, for whatever reason.

Make every effort that all customers are satisfied before they walk out of your door. You may never have the chance to do it again and everyone that that dissatisfied customer meets may be told of the unfortunate incident at your store. They may not come to your store if there was ever that chance they would.

Talk to the world online via your blog. This has got to be the best invention since a website and the internet itself started. Where else can you talk about nearly anything and let the world read it? You may just develop a following not only locally, but around the world.

Have event nights. This is great for weekends and ‘dead’ times. Earlier, I spoke about customers coming to your shop if you asked them to. This is where you have that chance. Events that will bring in business are almost plentiful. A few examples are trivia night, open mikes, singer-songwriter and other music performances, book signings and poetry. It can also be just about anything else you can think of that is of interest to others. A word of caution about playing DVD’s and TV/cable shows: Most of these are copyright protected and although you may not think you are breaking any laws, it can be construed as such. It’s a royalty issue because you are making money on your beverages, in your establishment showing a DVD bought for ‘personal’ use. Just be careful here. Some satellite services allow this with a paid subscription, however.

It’s been my experience that this coupon mailers are usually a waste of money in the specialty coffee industry. There are way too many coupons in most of these mailers and most recipients throw them out. I know I do.

Internet advertising is good if you can limit to advertising locally using your zip code. You can reach a captive audience on the internet. It’s relatively inexpensive because you choose what to spend on each ad and only pay per click. This is also good if you choose to sell whole beans online, however if you do not roast in-house this may be cost and inventory prohibitive.

Be careful when using coupons in any form. Coupons tend to cheapen the specialty coffee industry so I do not recommend using them. Bogo’s (buy one get one) are ok for some advertising, like opening a new coffee shop but, you will get your bargain seekers that wait for those coupons in order to patronize you. You could create more monsters!

You will also, occasionally get regulars that bring in the coupons. Even though they are as deserving of the coupon as anyone else is, your aim is to get NEW customers so the ‘coupon’ doesn’t always work. The only way I recommend a coupon is for a first time customer. You can usually get mailing addresses of new residents from your chamber of commerce and do a select, targeted mailing to the new residents only.

So there are some easy, mostly economic ways to effectively advertise and market your coffee shop. Remember, your customer service and quality will always have to be top notch but you can skimp on some advertising dollars by being crafty and conservative.

Opening A Coffee Shop A to Z – eBook
The insider’s guide to opening and running your own profitable coffee shop. Includes many bonuses including grant and investor sources along with a plethora of recipes you can use for your business.
Opening A Coffee Shop A to Z – eBook

Before starting with a coffee shop, it is a must to create a business plan which will help in running the coffee shop business in an expedient manner.

The business plan of a coffee shop should begin with how the owner proposes to manage the day to day operations of the coffee shop which includes interacting with the customers, dealing with the suppliers of stock material, management of financial records etc.

The next part of the business plan should consist of all the equipments and tools required to run a coffee shop along with handling of their daily operations and their maintenance which also includes all kinds of preventive maintenance as well.

The most important part of the business plan for the coffee shop is the financial aspect of it. The finances can be managed by the individual alone or a loan can be taken from the bank. Usually the loan officer asks for a cost effective and efficient business plan which shows the estimated growth of the investment made by the bank.

Also the business plan should include the location of the coffee shop. Usually people prefer to set up a coffee shop in their homes as they start the business in order to reduce the starting the costs. Buildings or shops can also be rented or leased or else if the owner has capital, he or she can also opt to buy a building.

Before starting the business, it is imperative to do a complete and thorough research about the coffee shop business.

Winding Up A Company

In these hard economic times business is very hard. If you are a company director looking for a bit of advice because your coffee shop business is struggling, you have come to the right place. I have created many articles which try to help a director take the right steps in either closing or liquidating a business or pre-packing a sale and starting again.

Firstly if your coffee shop company is insolvent you have a duty as a director to close the company and not incur any further debt, unless you can be pretty sure that you can put in place a rescue plan to turn that business around. If you can’t them you need to liquidate the company yourself or take professional advice on how best to close the business in an orderly fashion.

By far the most popular choice is to engage an insolvency practitioner to call a meeting of creditors on your behalf, prepare the statement of affairs, hold the meeting and then deal with all the procedural aspects of liquidation necessary to make sure all creditors now what is going on and how they can participate in any dividend. This is called a CVL or creditors voluntary liquidation.

There is a fee for all this and generally it will be about £5000 whoever you use around the country. There are some advertisements for liquidations at less than this but by the time all costs are accounted for, it will still come in at about the same sum.

These costs can come out of the assets of the coffee shop company and indeed many businesses do have just enough assets or cash to take this final step. For many businesses, the central core of what the business does is still profitable and so often directors will want to continue to trade. This is easily possible and a sale of assets can be arranged to a new company and a lease re-assigned by a landlord, which often leaves the new company trading on in the same line of work from the same premises.

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Marketing Plan for a Coffee Shop

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As a successful businessman with many years experience of running a shop fitting company and setting up and running coffee shops, Don Clarke knows the two most important factors for a successful shop are location, location, location and staff.

With regard to managing staff, Don quickly realized something that was contradictory to accepted beliefs: the customer does not come first – your staff should come first! If your employees are happy, then they will give excellent service to your customers, and your customers will be happy. So, it is worth taking note of the following points:

1. Teach your staff how to handle difficult situations. If you observe them handling a difficult situation badly, do not criticize. Tell them “I don’t know how I would have dealt with that problem – I’ll need to think about it”

2. Treat your staff with courtesy and respect. They will usually give the same in return.

3. Discuss your training requirements with your supervisors before you begin to train your staff, so that your management structure is cohesive and working towards the same goals.

4. Set weekly or monthly training sessions. Use these sessions to highlight strengths and weaknesses of your staff, and ask your staff if there are any points they wish to raise.

5. NEVER reprimand any member of staff in front of other staff or customers. If you have a complaint with their work, discuss this in private.

6. If you have a problem with a member of staff, raise the problem you wish to discuss and finish with praise. If you manage your staff with tact, they will listen to your complaint without resentment.

7. Finally, remember – you are creating a team, without your team you do not have a business.

With regard to the location of a coffee shop, many people overlook this starting point. They look for a shop that will cost them the least rent and tell themselves that their shop will be run so well that people will flock to it. But remember, consumers are fickle! And lazy! If your shop is not in the right place, whatever you do and whatever you offer, your business will be limited by its location.

So, don’t commit yourself to any premises until you know how many people will pass by your shop each day. You will be investing a huge amount of your time and money into your new business and you really won’t want it to fail. Put aside as much time as possible to find the best position for your shop. Take a clipboard and stand outside a popular coffee shop – count how many people walk past the shop and how many stop for a coffee. Do this at different times of the day, and different days of the week. Take a note of the nearby shops that are attracting shoppers – you need your coffee shop to be convenient for people who “shop ’til they drop” and then need refreshment.

On average, customers tend to spend around £4 a head in a coffee shop, perhaps slightly more in expensive areas. You can use this as a basis to work out how many customers you will need per day to cover your costs and make a profit. So, if your operating costs, which will include repayment of setting up costs, wages, food, utility bills and last, but not least, profits, require you to make £3500 per week, you will need at least 125 people per day spending a minimum of £4 each, to give you the £500 needed per day, based on a 7 day working week.

So remember – do the maths first and foremost and make sure your shop is in a location where it will have enough passing trade to cover your costs. Treat your staff well and you are on the way to turning coffee into gold!

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Original or bust! Copy-catting design may seem like a sure-fire recipe for success, but in the long term it will do your coffee shop more harm than good.

Here is the content of an email I received recently from a reader in Saudi Arabia:

Dear Nigel,

I am an owner of coffee drive-through and recently I opened a dine-in shop.

I designed my coffee shop to be modern, basing the style on pictures from the net and getting ideas from some famous restaurants — but the final result is not really very attractive, in my opinion

I have opened the shop, but business is slow and I feel an improvement in the design would go a long way towards at­tracting more customers.

How would you suggest I do this?

I often receive letters like this, from outlet owners who have copied designs and ended up with unsuccessful outlets.

To be fair, you can find these kinds of short-lived, derivative, copy-cat designs pretty much wherever you go in the world, not just in the Middle East — but it is true that most of the outlets that have sprung up in the hotels and malls of Dubai have been done before elsewhere.

If you’d prefer a new, exciting, successful outlet then you should adopt the MAYA principle: ‘Most Advanced Yet Acceptable’.

I don’t claim to have invented this ethos; it was first used by famous American industrial designer Raymond Loewy, who made fortunes convincing the corporations of America to be original by simply asserting that “ugly doesn’t sell”.

My message is that if you want to create a truly successful, recession-proof concept, you have to break the mould.

Frustratingly, my attempts to convince operators in the region to do anything new and original have nearly always been met with scepticism.

I have come to the reluctant conclusion that this comes down to a cultural division: despite its veneer of modernity, the Middle East remains obstinately conservative.

Businesses operated via the ‘command, control and procurement’ school of thought are ultimately cost-driven and out-moded, compared with the flexible and imaginative methods seen in Europe and America.

This applies across business generally, but F&B outlets in particular can benefit when creativity is at the centre of their propositions.

The problem is that to originate a truly new MAYA café or restaurant, a lot of ‘wrong’ ideas have to be discarded, so there’s no way of shortcutting with a quick, cheap design pitch. No matter how hard you stamp your feet in front of your designer, an origi­nal idea will take time and money.

Here’s the nub of the problem: it’s all about trust. Designers offering MAYA are in effect saying, ‘pay us a lot and we’ll deliver something we can’t yet picture and we’re not sure how long it will take to deliver’.

For most operators with bosses or banks to please, on tight budgets and timescales, this is not a very attractive message! It’s far more controllable and comfortable to buy in a well-worn franchise.

And what makes originality even harder to implement is that all operators have a tendency to revert to the emotional safety of what they already know works, even though the idea may be old hat.

This may help your business meet short-term objectives, but is unlikely to be a safe and successful long-term strategy — after all, you can’t lead by following.

At the end of the day, a MAYA design will always outperform a boring, tried-and-tested, ‘safe’ formula.

So if your outlet is quiet, maybe it’s time to stop looking outwards to see what new ideas the world can give you.

Instead, why not trust and empower your designer and look inside yourself to see what new ideas you can give to the world?

Nigel Witham MCSD MIOD writer, designer and photographer Member of the Chartered Society of Designers (interior and graphic design disciplines)

I designed my first restaurant in Richmond, London in 1990 and it is still there and successful today.

Today my team and I provide, professional bar, cafe, and restaurant design, CAD drafting, visualization and project management worldwide. I also write about design in many magazines.

Although we have worked mainly in the UK we have production offices in India and New Zealand. I am currently spending most time in London but often visit Europe, NYC and the UAE.

Author Links

http://www.nigelw.com/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nigel-Witham-Designer/326102020217?ref=nfhttp://www.facebook.com/pages

Coffee Shop Business Planner
A complete coffee shop business plan to help you get the planning process started. Facts and figures updated yearly.
Coffee Shop Business Planner