How's business?? My "dream" one day would be to open up a successful coffee shop here in Houston. I have 0 business background, but no better time to start learning/planning than the present. Anyone else have similar small business dreams?? Maybe you're already successful in doing so??
The infrastructure already exists for laundering money through convenience stores. Why reinvent the wheel?
PM me through the board and I'll be glad to answer any questions you may have. I've owned and managed a few coffee shops for a few years now.
If you are actually wanting to start a business, buy this book: Successful Business Plan: Secrets & Strategies (Successful Business Plan Secrets and Strategies) by Rhonda Abrams It is dry, and a little boring, but is one of the best books for how to write a great business plan.
I don't have a coffee shop business per say (my family is in the food business though) but I do know someone who started this some time last year (around September).He's actually my old boss and he left my company last summer to go on a sabbatical and help his wife open up a coffee shop. I've been once and it was nice, tidy little shop. It's not Starbucks busy but from what I've been told, they do have a crowd every once in a while. I haven't been since last year and I just did a Google search on it and found out that it closed down this year! Note: This is just an anecdote and does not reflect the entire coffee shop market. My 2 cents on it. I feel like coffee shops are a bit challenging to open in Houston due to a combination of competition, weather, and convenience. I think coffee shops are better suited to cities that is more pedestrian-oriented and cooler in temperature. IMO, if you can get a specific theme going and not your run of the mill hipster stuff, it could separate you and your competition right off the bat. Standard "Location and Marketing is key" applies here. I've looked into some specialty food ventures and have a couple ideas going. Just not sure if I wanna do food business in arguably the food capital of the state if not country.
My advice would be that the barrier to entry to the coffee shop business is very low so you should expect it to be very hard and profits to be low. I would only advise doing it if you are someone who already has a bunch of money and can afford to blow some of it to pursue a lark.
As someone who loves visiting different coffee shops, I'd say the next few years are probably the worst time to open one. Now, I haven't been to Houston so maybe it's different but where I live, there are a ton of options already. I also recently visited Colorado Springs. I googled coffee shops and there were soooo many options. I was there for a week so I think I got to visit 3 or 4. My point is that there is so much competition already, it's gonna be hard unless you really stand out among the group. And tons of people will mindlessly flock to Starbucks no matter what, so that'll always be a big competitor. Don't listen to them about the weather, as iced coffee is a big deal now. Whoever thought of that is brilliant. Last thing, whatever business you open, make sure you have GOOD CUSTOMER SERVICE. I worked for Publix for 6 years. It was built from the ground up by one man entirely based around customer service and it's now one of the 50 biggest companies in the world. People will actually pay more to shop there over competitors because they know someone will be there to help/answer questions, the employees will be polite, and they can easily return things. People will pay more! Think about that.
Use Porter's Five Competitive forces to study the industry. Proft margins are low and unless oyu can get **** loads of volume (unlikely due to established competition) you may struggle
the toughest part of this business is to know what do people may like , ....which can be hard to predict, a guy once brewed his coffee using an old underwear then he soaked it in whipped cream and ppl really liked it & this's how starbucks had started
first how much cash/capital do you have to invest? depending on how much you have dictates how big of a coffee business you can start you can start from small like coffee vending, coffee cart/kiosk, coffee truck, coffee shop in a strip center, coffee shop in a mall, or stand alone building also seems you have to either franchise one or have a moms & pops one but pair it with some dessert, snacks or other business like a laundrymat (which is expensive) personally might be more easier to make money with a beer/wine bar, 24 hour video, or those non alcoholic bev strip clubs
