Let's build a business.

[nyg23]

I'm not familiar with the geography of the area but people kept bringing up how transportation was an issue for students. You might want to look into providing the transportation for the students to the door via. a small van/bus that would be free of charge granted they are going to be or were a customer. It might get abused a bit but to have them return to the campuses they would have to show their hand that had already been stamped at the door. What drunks don't like a free ride back to their places? This would also set you apart from the competition if it is indeed unique to the area.

Also in general make sure you look into local laws regarding business hours, serving alcohol, and serving food. There might be a reason the whole town shuts down at 1AM.

[Chaostracize]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not familiar with the geography of the area but people kept bringing up how transportation was an issue for students. You might want to look into providing the transportation for the students to the door via. a small van/bus that would be free of charge granted they are going to be or were a customer. It might get abused a bit but to have them return to the campuses they would have to show their hand that had already been stamped at the door. What drunks don't like a free ride back to their places? This would also set you apart from the competition if it is indeed unique to the area.

Also in general make sure you look into local laws regarding business hours, serving alcohol, and serving food. There might be a reason the whole town shuts down at 1AM.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am also very interested in this, as well. I think it would be fairly cheap (aka, hire a student driver, and pay him less than minimum wage under the table or something, and stress to patrons that they should tip generously), however, the problem is that this could be a major liability, with having overstuffed vans and/or accidents. This is something I definitely want to look into, because having a radio system with one or two drivers would be [censored] amazing.

In terms of your second idea about what times business close down...keep in mind that no bar here serves food, all income is alcohol. Many food places are open until 2 or 3 am. The few places that do have food and serve alcohol, are full on restaurants as well, so it wouldn't make much sense for them to keep serving anyway.

[Chaostracize]

[ QUOTE ]
Chaos,

Great updates.

" (fortunately the staircase is wide enough to host lines for both the bathrooms and the bar entrance)."

As you've discussed somewhat, disabled access is the first thing that comes to mind.

Also, potential fire code issues maybe?

[/ QUOTE ]

I learned something about handicap accessibility that I will address in my update. Regarding fire code...not sure yet, that's a question for the architect.

[Chaostracize]

Not too much has transpired since the last update, although I have gotten bills from both architects.

Architect 1 gave me an estimate for $1400, the designer will be paid 50/hr and the architect will be paid 80/hr, which I take to be nothing more than initial drawings of the plan. She also mentioned she was able to help out with getting whatever I need in terms of town's approval for the building as well.

Architect 2 sent me an estimate of $44,000. Which, from what I gather, is the drawings, weekly meetings until the project is finished, consulting with the construction team, helping bid the plan out to a construction team, and making sure everything is good to go with the city.

Kind of a disparity in estimates, and until I'm 100% sure what I want to do with the layout and have everything with the business plan and the partnership worked out, I'm going to wait a week or so before I figure out exactly who will be doing what, and what will/will not be covered.

One interesting thing that I learned from architect 2, is that you do not have to spend more than 20% of the total cost of construction on handicap accessibility. Meaning, that if I spend $300,000 on handicap accessibility, if an elevator cost $80,000 I would not have to put it in (and if it cost $50,000, I would...first you need to make sure entry is accessible, then bathrooms, then one other thing, then ability to get to other floors...I'm a little unsure in this area, but this is what I've got).

I'll be talking with my partner Tuesday of next week to really smooth out what our roles will be. I know he is interested in this project, but I need to know how interested. Someone who will give me bits of suggestions here and there isn't someone I'm looking for, and I'm suspecting that's all he's willing to put into it. If that's the case I'll be trying to cozy up to some business owners in the area, but I don't want to think about that until next Tuesday when I know for sure. The main thing for me right now, is that he's definitely got to put money in this so he has a very real stake. Apart from that, I will see when we sit down and talk about it.

I am planning on pushing back when I plan on opening the place up. Since this is the first time I'm doing this, logistically I need to give myself a lot more time. Regarding issues such raising money and construction, trying to put a deadline on this wouldn't make sense since I have no real avenues for raising capital and I can't estimate a timeline for the construction. Right now I'm aiming for around August of next year, which will allow for a bit of time to be open before school starts, at which point we can have a 2nd Grand Opening, essentially.

Being an owner of the space, basically, is essential here. I can't imagine how I would do this if I had to be paying a stiff rent for 10 months before I opened, but owning the place won't be too bad.

Oh, another thing. I went and spoke to Gary Ferguson, who is in charge of prettying up the Commons, essentially. He is trying to get more stores in the Commons, and is the one who got the grant from the government that allows business owners to fix up their facades, and only put in half the money (up to $10k...pretty sweet deal). He loved the idea of a nightclub, but his one concern was that the first floor would be shut down during the day, which hurts commerce. He strongly suggested that I find something to put on the first floor, something that would benefit both of us...added revenue for me and another open business for him. I agree with this, even though it doesn't fit with my original idea, so I'm back to the arcade idea. I think this would work on a few different levels. If the bottom floor was it's own separate business, and was half arcade, half fast, fried food, this would go along well with people leaving the nightclub. Plus, this might be a way around handicap accessibility. If both business are in charge, separately, of making a place handicap accessible, then that would take an elevator out of the equation. Also, this is much better for image, because I kept having this nagging feeling, that if I wanted to tote a 3 floor place as a nightclub/bar/lounge, it would take away from the legit nightclub feeling, which is really what I want to go for. If the bottom floor is separated from the top two, then they would be completely separate, and the crowd that's coming in for fast food/video games won't be put off by loud music coming from upstairs. Plus, this area would be easy to run and could stay open from noon or 11 AM on, and would be a nice additional source of revenue, (which looking at conservative estimates from the business plan, would be an extremely nice buffer to have).

That is all I have for now. If anyone has any additional ideas, like always, please post them.

[Chaostracize]

So weird. Literally seconds after I finish my post, I get a call from Stu (my prospective manager from England). I wasn't able to talk (got a soccer game in 10 minutes), but I'll be talking to him tomorrow afternoon.

I also had a really hard time understanding him over the phone...I haven't heard a British accent in about 8 months

[Chaostracize]

Not really sure if anyone is interested in this anymore, but I thought I'd update anyway since it's been almost 2 weeks.

I had a discussion with the person who I had previously referred to as my partner, and he made it clear that he would help out as much as he could but he's not interested in having a stake in the business, as that's not where his interests lie. That's fine, as I have also talked to the person from England about coming and managing the business and he is 100% into it. The issue now is getting a visa for him...something we're both not sure how to accomplish...anyone have any experience with this?

The business plan is essentially finished. There needs to be some tweaking with numbers and I'll be going over the plan with Jeff (previous partner) tomorrow to get it 100% finished. I suppose it wouldn't be too difficult to upload it somehow, so that I can get feedback from others here who have experience with business plans (although, I take that back now that I think about it...it's already 42 pages long. I'm using Palo Alto's Business Plan software, which is really thorough. So, not sure what I'll be doing with that for the time being.)

The building is set to close in 3 weeks, and I need to make a decision about an architect soon. I think I will be asking Tom, the architect who gave me the $44k quote, to give me a quote where he just draws up what I want, and we'll have it at that, so I can compare the two architects on the same level. They've both gotten good peer reviews, so I'm not sure how much research I can do into either of them, since I don't know architecture. I do know Tom designed RasaSpa, which is a spa adjoining the new gym in Ithaca, and Claudia has done a lot of different projects on the Commons...so for me right now, it's an issue of who I'll work best with ... and who's cheaper.

Also, we found in the survey of the property that half of our fears were confirmed. The fear being that the property line only extended to the inside of the wall and didn't share it. Well, it just so happens we do share the inside of the wall, but only on one side...the other side we own up to the wall, which could create some serious issues, but that's something I'll have to talk to the architect about.

So right now, I'm still going with arcade and fried food as separate business on first floor, bar on second floor and dance area on third floor.

One idea that my girlfriend mentioned would be to raise the 2nd floor ceiling to allow more head space, since there will be so much room on the 3rd floor anyway, and this is another consideration to ask the architect about. Since we're building those floors from scratch essentially (although, the joists are good and heavy duty, so it would be a shame to take those out), I think it might be worth it so the bar isn't nasty and stuffy.

Right now, the business plan is calling for 12 people, a mixture of the manager, bartenders, waitress (to bring around mini shots), coat check, and security...which is definitely hefty, but with a manager I should be able to handle it ok.

Right now, honestly, my biggest fear is accounting. I know a lot of money will be going to my accountant to help me get that set-up, and I have no idea what those charges will be ($2k? $3k).

Once the business plan is 100% good to go, I will be bringing it by the SBA to see what kind loan I can secure. The plan is calling for $200k from the SBA (and another $90k from investors). Although that may be too high/low depending on what the architect says. And now that I am 100% sure about what's going in there, we can get a definite estimate.

So, that's all I can think of for right now. If anyone has a good response, I would love a good response.

Also, just finished reading E-Myth, which may be the best book I've ever read. Reading E-Myth Mastery right now.

Am 1/4 of the way through Guerilla Marketing, and finished Purple Cow as well, which was also great.

[Zeestein]

Thanks for the updates!

[adrockuk]

Just a quick note to say that I'm enjoying reading about your progress. I noticed you had 5 back to back replies written by yourself, I wouldn't want you to think no ones interested and stop posting.

[El Diablo]

Chaos,

"Once the business plan is 100% good to go, I will be bringing it by the SBA to see what kind loan I can secure. The plan is calling for $200k from the SBA (and another $90k from investors)."

Fascinating updates. What sort of operating capital reserves do you have in the plan?

[adsman]

Hey Chaos,

I missed this thread due to the fact that I've been so flat out opening and running my own bar/club here in Italy. I've read through all the thread and there are a few things that I'd like to comment on. I'd also like to add that I started working in bars and clubs back in 1988 and have worked in the business on three different continents in bars, clubs restaurants and a mixture between the three.

1. Staff.

Your business plan calls for 12 staff. I have two. One of them is a top notch bartender and worth her weight in gold. I consider myself extremely fortunate to have her. The other is crap, but I expected that. I rotate through 3 different DJ's and do it myself on quieter nights. I have the luxury of having my partner behind the bar with me as well.

Good staff are very hard to find. Good staff that won't steal from you are even harder. And you want 12 of them. This is a huge call, much bigger than I think you realise. Cut this down as much as you can. Waitress to bring around mini-shots? Cut. Etc.

I wouldn't even consider a manager for my own bar at this point. It's hands on for me. I want to know what is going on. In the future I will want one, but I want to know my business inside and out before I get one so I know what he needs to do. I'll also need that time to find a good one that I trust.

You want to get one right away though. OK, but you need to ditch this English dude asap. Apart from all the hassles of visas and stuff which you don't need at the moment and I imagine that are a lot harder to get than you realise, your manager must be from the town where you are opening the bar. Period. Or at least to have lived there for some time. The manager is the host. He looks after the clients, he knows the different groups and social complexities within the nucleus of the city. He needs to be able to do a huge variety of tasks that will in the end make or break your business. You don't want to be entrusting this role to some nice guy that you met in Europe who is kicking around at the moment not knowing what to do with himself. You also need to be able to get rid of your new manager quickly if things aren't working out. If you bring a guy over from Europe to do this then you'll be emotionally tied to him. This is a very bad idea.

2. What are you?

You want to be an arcade, a food service, a bar and a dance room. You want to do a lot of things and what you'll probably end up doing is a mediocre job on all of them. Pick one of these things and do it the best that you can. The first one I would dump is the fried food. Food is complicated and hard to do well. The second is the arcade stuff. But you don't have to dump it - incorperate it into the bar/club. Make some booths but instead of tables put in the old fashioned flat-table space invader games. Do creative stuff like this to create an interesting space. Looking at the photo's I would work to create a club on the first two floors and see how that goes before expaning upwards.

3. Construction.

It sounds like a nightmare with the common walls. You've made no mention of soundproofing and problems with noise. I hope you have no residential around you. Don't even think about leasing the top two floors out as residential above a night-club. Raising ceilings? Dude, work with what you've got. Have you seen my thread with the before and after photo's of my bar? 35 grand my friend. That's all we spent.

4. Your target market.

I'm still confused who they are. It sounds like you're trying to appeal to everyone. A word of advice; the 35 year old crowd does not like to hang out with the 18 year old crowd. Work out who will fill your place and who will spend more and where the current vacuum is and target accordingly.

5. Your vision statement.

Do one. Don't know what one is? Find out. It's your vision for your establishment. You need to write it down and stick to it. If you ever decide to do something in the business, go back and check if it is in line with your vision statement. If it isn't, tank it. Your vision statement is an evolving thing. Mine took me two weeks to write and comes in at three small paragraphs, but it is the foundation of what we are doing.