Advice desperately needed

[eventsrus]

Just over a year ago I lost my job in the construction industry, as I had only been with the employer 6 months I never received any redundancy payment. At the time my partner was 3 months pregnant. She had just finished her uni course which meant she was not on any maternity pay.

I have always wanted to be self employed so i decided to give it a go. While visiting family 2 years ago in London I came across a business that seemed to be very successful. The idea was this company signed up restuarants who would pay £25 per week and the company would arrange a group of 8 - 12. people to visit the restuarant one night of the week. So basically it was like a dinner party with all strangers. This seemed to work as they had over 150 restuarants signed up and restuarants wee signing up and paying 3 months fees up front at £300.

I decided to set up a similar business without any real funding. I had applied to various organisations and none could help me out. I visited many restuarant managers and it did not go well at all. To be honest it was all a bit of a disaster. I was going into restuarants and maybe they would say leave some info. I never had anything to give them when I did mange to get stuff sorted it was printed on home computer so it did not even look that great. Even my business cards were printed off on home computer. It would not help when they asked how many other restuarants have I got and I would have to say none. I managed to get a student to design a holding website page for me saying that site was coming soon but this was up for months as I could not afford to get site done. It did not seem proffessional at all. It got to the stage where I was going to visit restaurant managers and I could feel it myself that I was low in confidence, I felt all shriveled up and looked gloom.

I got to the stage where I decided the 3 months upfront was not working and that I would change it to one weeks fees at a time meaning they would be risking £25 at most. Problem I had was I had contacted most of the restuarants in the local area. I then had a bad back injury which stopped me from continuing with the business at the time.

I am now considering giving it another go and have been thinking about it for a few weeks now. I now have enough funding for the website and to get some info packs proffessionaly printed.

At night I am raring to give it a go, I believe it can work but every morning when I get up I have doubts in my head and just think that I will be a failure.

I dont know if trying it again would be a good idea due to the fact that last year I spoke to a lot of the restuarants and I came across as a bit of a sham and a con if im honest. Will they all remember that and say no way to giving me a chance?

I have 2 kids and my partner is unable to work due to just having baby. Im on Jobseekers just now and cant really seem to find much work out there, the jobs that I am coming across are NMW paying about £850 per month. Straight away I would have to pay £500 for council tax and rent leaving me with around £350 per month. I know with self employment I would not be any better off for a while but I feel that I could get the chance to build it up and get better earnings and also have something to show for it.

 

[businessfunding]

I'm not sure exactly what advice you are looking for?

Before you pitch back into your business you need to put together a coherent business plan using the lessons learned from your first attempt.

As you are on JSA you might get onto the NEA scheme which will provide you with a mentor and potentially a small loan

You might also qualify for a start-up loan

No one can really say if you will succeed in your business, but as you evolve your plan the questions and answers will become far more focused.

Hope that helps a bit..

 

[FIZIX Agency]

Firstly, I don't think it was a good idea to approach restaurants in the way you did.

One of the problems with restaurants is that when they are open, so you can walk through the door, the manager will be busy. They will have a load of other things on their mind and won't be able to focus on what you are trying to offer them.

This is true of all companies really, I have never walked into a businesses premises to sell them my services in an unsolicited manner. These companies are doing business and have all the things they need to do on a day to day basis to get on with.

You will be an unsolicited hindrance to that and an annoyance.

If you want to approach them directly you'd be better off sending them a good brochure that they can look over when they aren't busy. I'm not sure how well it would do but it would be better than confronting them while they are busy managing the restaurant.

Or even dropping an email to them with a link to your website, so they can peruse that at their own leisure. A phone call, to a place like a restaurant, probably isn't going to be remembered.

It would also give you an opportunity to explain what it is you are offering and the benefits they can gain, without them being distracted.


Getting onto the website, no website is better than a coming soon screen. You need to make sure you create the website properly and market it well.


So tip 1 from me would be to get your website and info pack (I assume a brochure) done properly. Don't use a student, I've never seen that go well. Use someone who can get on side and knows what they are doing. Someone who can guide you as well as output content for you. Make a solid plan that is based on research and understanding your business, your clients and your clients clients needs and the benefits you can provide to them (both the client - restaurant and the client's clients - consumers).


Tip 2 would be to approach them again. Just because it went badly the first time does not mean you have burned bridges. Some may remember you, some may not. Some may care, some may not. Don't be defeated.

You say you came across as a sham or a con. Is that based on anything you can identify or is that coming from you feeling defeated?

 

[businessfunding]

sorry Fizix I really don't agree with you on this. This is very much a cold calling business and face-to-face visits are by far the most powerful medium

Brochures sent by post will not yield results.

 

[FIZIX Agency]

My experience with restaurants is limited but I have worked with a few in the past and from my experience its very difficult to tie the manager down when the restaurant is open, and that's when you are actually working with them.

That's what I based my statement on, but then my experience might not be representative of all restaurants so I am happy to be corrected.

 

[cjd]

Firstly drop all the 'my wife's pregnant, i don't have a job stuff' - it's irrelevant. Harsh but true. Your customers would be terrified if they knew, so don't even think it.

Secondly, getting small business people to pay upfront for something that they've never heard of is impossible - except the stupid, who don't last long in business.

What you haven't said is that you have an eager and waiting bunch of customers that are just desperate to be sent somewhere.

The 'somewhere' is actually the easy bit - any restaurant will give you a backhander for regularly sending them 8 customers (well I assume they will, if they won't you have no business) - what you'd need to convince me would be to send me customers. Once you've proven that, I might be prepared to pay you.

But even then, probably only after the fact.

 

[JonathanSEO]

It would be utterly pointless not to mention stupid to get fancy brochures and websites made up for a completely unproven business model. You need to actually see if this works before you do all that otherwise you're just spunking money up a wall.

Can you explain how this works in some more detail? I'm a little confused.

Hypothetical - I'm a restaurant owner, I pay you £25 per week and you get me a table of 10 people to visit my restaurant m one night and they spend £30 a head for example. So I generate £300. Then the next week I pay you another £25 and you get me another 10 different people? Is that how it works?

Where do you get these people from and convince them to visit my restaurant?

Do the people visiting my restaurant pay full price?

If that company you mentioned had 150 restaurants, where were they finding 1500 people from per week to eat out?

Obviously if you can guarantee a restaurant owner a table of 10 on a quiet Tuesday evening for £25 then he'd go for it. But I can't figure out how this works?

 

[rinnypeter]

Just over a year ago I lost my job in the construction industry, as I had only been with the employer 6 months I never received any redundancy payment. At the time my partner was 3 months pregnant. She had just finished her uni course which meant she was not on any maternity pay.

I have always wanted to be self employed so i decided to give it a go. While visiting family 2 years ago in London I came across a business that seemed to be very successful. The idea was this company signed up restuarants who would pay £25 per week and the company would arrange a group of 8 - 12. people to visit the restuarant one night of the week. So basically it was like a dinner party with all strangers. This seemed to work as they had over 150 restuarants signed up and restuarants wee signing up and paying 3 months fees up front at £300.

I decided to set up a similar business without any real funding. I had applied to various organisations and none could help me out. I visited many restuarant managers and it did not go well at all. To be honest it was all a bit of a disaster. I was going into restuarants and maybe they would say leave some info. I never had anything to give them when I did mange to get stuff sorted it was printed on home computer so it did not even look that great. Even my business cards were printed off on home computer. It would not help when they asked how many other restuarants have I got and I would have to say none. I managed to get a student to design a holding website page for me saying that site was coming soon but this was up for months as I could not afford to get site done. It did not seem proffessional at all. It got to the stage where I was going to visit restaurant managers and I could feel it myself that I was low in confidence, I felt all shriveled up and looked gloom.

I got to the stage where I decided the 3 months upfront was not working and that I would change it to one weeks fees at a time meaning they would be risking £25 at most. Problem I had was I had contacted most of the restuarants in the local area. I then had a bad back injury which stopped me from continuing with the business at the time.

I am now considering giving it another go and have been thinking about it for a few weeks now. I now have enough funding for the website and to get some info packs proffessionaly printed.

At night I am raring to give it a go, I believe it can work but every morning when I get up I have doubts in my head and just think that I will be a failure.

I dont know if trying it again would be a good idea due to the fact that last year I spoke to a lot of the restuarants and I came across as a bit of a sham and a con if im honest. Will they all remember that and say no way to giving me a chance?

I have 2 kids and my partner is unable to work due to just having baby. Im on Jobseekers just now and cant really seem to find much work out there, the jobs that I am coming across are NMW paying about £850 per month. Straight away I would have to pay £500 for council tax and rent leaving me with around £350 per month. I know with self employment I would not be any better off for a while but I feel that I could get the chance to build it up and get better earnings and also have something to show for it.

Yes this is the best option she opted to earn money. Home based jobs are much easy and comfortable. We are the owners of our own and here we are independent of all the office's boring environment.