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Who here has started their own business?
Lasabar
Posts: 4,472 ✭✭✭
I've worked in Retail Management for over 7 years, I make a damn good salary that supports a nice car, nice apartment and no real qualms about a cigar budget... I have been presented with an opportunity (not completely fleshed out yet) to completely change my direction.
My future Father-in-law has always shown interest in starting his own business, he almost bought a bar/restaurant but the owner went bankrupt while he had cash in hand, He wanted to buy a tanning salon that his daughter's worked at for they knew the business and it was profitable, etc. etc... He has taken an instant liking to me and offered to talk more about opening up a Hot Dog business in his local city. He has always driven MILES to other places in Milwuakee, Brookfield and other surrounding suburbs and his town has no such place and he is very interested in starting it up by purchasing an old restaurant that has since closed.
What I have a question about is, has anyone done or seen anything like this? (Not the partnering with family thing, that's a whole other bowl of wax, but starting your own restaurant?)
I'm very interested for I have a passion for cooking and like the idea of being my own boss, plus HE has stated he would front all the money, I would work for him and then have the opportunity to buy it from his in the future when he gets too old (He's already retired from his previous job)
I know I'd take a pay cut, I know it could fail, I know I'd be giving up my stock options, 401k etc.... But the fact of building a business from scratch, making it succeed and potentially building my future is super exciting...
Any tips or suggestions?
My future Father-in-law has always shown interest in starting his own business, he almost bought a bar/restaurant but the owner went bankrupt while he had cash in hand, He wanted to buy a tanning salon that his daughter's worked at for they knew the business and it was profitable, etc. etc... He has taken an instant liking to me and offered to talk more about opening up a Hot Dog business in his local city. He has always driven MILES to other places in Milwuakee, Brookfield and other surrounding suburbs and his town has no such place and he is very interested in starting it up by purchasing an old restaurant that has since closed.
What I have a question about is, has anyone done or seen anything like this? (Not the partnering with family thing, that's a whole other bowl of wax, but starting your own restaurant?)
I'm very interested for I have a passion for cooking and like the idea of being my own boss, plus HE has stated he would front all the money, I would work for him and then have the opportunity to buy it from his in the future when he gets too old (He's already retired from his previous job)
I know I'd take a pay cut, I know it could fail, I know I'd be giving up my stock options, 401k etc.... But the fact of building a business from scratch, making it succeed and potentially building my future is super exciting...
Any tips or suggestions?
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However, if you're gonna do hot dogs I would suggest having "mobile sites", aka carts. Every construction site I work at, there is always a crowd around them. Every business area I work by, people are lined up around the corner at lunch time. I think taking your business TO your target customers is huge, and would be easy to do in the hot dog business. If you make it 1) convenient, 2) affordable, and 3) DEEEELISH, I think you can do well.
Disclaimer - see my opening statement, as I may be talking our my a$$ since Ive never done it.
You can easily do 5k a week (work week, not including weekends) during lunch time. That does not include dinner. A local hot dog shop has a walk up window that is open as the bars close up. They make bank during the 2 and 3am hours. Sure people are drunk but none of it is in the establishment.
I started my own business and just recently closed it bc I relocated. I think my biggest problem was people, meaning friends and family, always wanted free stuff. I had no problem giving but it got to the point where a lot of people were asking for a handout. It became very hard to tell someone "no they have to pay full price" when they've been my friend all these years. Eventually they got the hint but a family business is interesting bc everyone in the family thinks they are entitled. Make sure you are legal, certified and anyone that is hired knows safety and is on the books. I think people that start businesses think they can get away with hiring teens to do work under the table but often times teens are a high turnover (which is an expense) and being it is usually one of their first jobs do not have the safety stuff down. It gets tricky when a teen gets hurt while being paid under the table on your clock.
Make sure you plan inventory. Often times in the beginning I was at work and was running to the store to grab a few things I missed. That gets better as you start seeing your customer flow.
Don't get stagnant in your marketing. Try new things. Look for gaps in the market (open after bars closed, catering etc..). Social media. Traditional ads. Blogs. Website. Lunch specials. Daily Deals - PEOPLE LOVE A GOOD DAILY DEAL
The math up there was fast and is just my idea of what a lunch rush would be based on my local hot dog shop but I think you could do 40K a month easily.
Seriously though, I don't have any experience with this. I do have some friends that took over an established hot dog restaurant from a relative and ended up getting out (selling it) after a year or two because it was very time intensive and they weren't making a lot of money.
I've done some research and looking at the "Low End" restaurant businesses and such (Taco Bell, McDonalds etc.) they have always been profitable in hard economic times and show steady trends on the uptick (YUM! brands stock price over the past 5 years) and looking at the current economic climate and the current culture of MOMMY doesn't cook at all anymore if I WERE to get into the restaurant business, it'd be on the cheap/easy route for consumers...
I also am looking at the "Cart" idea, and that would be best... Every day there seems to be something happening in Milwaukee and having some Hot Dogs around would seem like a no brainer (I ALSO, have bought my fair share of "Street meat" at 2AM and would love to be the guy SELLING those!
I have to really flesh out more concerns, but just keep the comments coming!
"Long ashes my friends."
My wife and I have owned a retail/wholesale/catering deli for almost 7 years now - she has been in food her whole life, I had other careers, but did own a juice bar/sandwich shop in a health club in the 80s for a few years....so my 2 cents I'm about to offer has some experience behind it.
1) Have a "fall back" position (that's why BlueRings' advice is the best in my opinion so far.)
2) Expect to work WAY harder and longer than you do now, for about 1/2 as much money, for about 1 to 2 years.............and it still may fail....(just look at start-up restaurant success rates)
3) Some things that many new business owners do is
a) underestimate the cost of getting started and staying in business
b) underestimate the time involved in getting started and in operating the business
c) underestimate the amount of paperwork involved in getting started and in managing the business
d) overestimate how profit they will make
With some REAL due diligence and analysis, you can avoid the pitfalls above for the most part.
The bottom line is this:
If you are prepared to work you a$$ off, and realize that you won't be making a lot of money initially, and you are reasonably smart and tough, you'll "make it." Now "making it" is different from one person to another. For my wife and I it's having a business that pays our bills, lets us save a little (not enough these days) and have a life (we're closed Sat & Sun). We're not getting rich, but no one can fire either one of us - and that's a good feeling and worth a lot.
Think about just that part of the entire statement.
Idiots. If there were enough work, the businesses wouldn't need tax credits to hire. And, if I'm them, I look to vets first. Bass Akward
I agree, giving tax credits to companies for hiring doesn't really work, well I should say small business's. I mean I would be hard pressed to hire someone if I didn't have enough work for them to do thus less money for me to spend to hire them. Basically the prez cannot just make laws, he proposes them and congress has to pass them.
And the real way to get our economy going isn't happening because people in congress won't agree to it. Hell congress couldn't even get back 5 billion in our tax dollars given to oil companies.