New ideas?

[Vaheed Akhtar]

Morning all,

I'm hoping to pick your brains and get some ideas on how I can expand one of my sandwich shops. The shop itself is a good business with a decent amount of profit. We have a good name our area and get people from up to 7-8 miles away coming in for our food. Lately, I've been thinking of strengthening the business, as I'm not one for resting laurels. I've got plenty of competition and generally, it doesn't last more than a year or so until someone else pops their head up.

The area the shop is situated has a massive industial, commercial and housing area - add to that umpteen schools and colleges, but, unfortunately, they're too far from the shop for students to travel to.

Here's a few ideas of mine and would appreciate your opinion on them and any experiences you have of similar things.

Buying a mobile shop. As I've mentioned, there's a massive surrounding of various ports, industrial and commercial areas. I could buy a van and have it kitted out and sell what we sell in the shop, but further afield. In order to do this, I would probably have to take on another member of staff to help with the prep; all sandwiches would have to be made first thing - ready for the road. That's not a problem. As I run 2 other shops, I wouldn't be able to do this 6 days a week - so enter another member of staff for the road. Then add to that the capital cost of the van and equipment, it starts sounding a little expensive. As for covering colleges and high schools and hospitals - I would have to get permission from the council and the hospitals - which is more than likely to be rejected. Could it be done?

Turning my flat upstairs into a diner: my rented property has a flat above the shop - which I use for storage. The landlord doesn't have a problem with the idea - but I will have to spend a few £££'s to get it up to regulation. There's already plenty of cafe's in this area - so I'm not sure if it would work.

Add new lines: how about introducing a bakery section? Fresh bread, cakes, pies and pastries? I'd have to buy a proper oven and take on a baking expert, but I can see lots of potential in this. Locally, there's no bakery. We have a Greggs bargain basement shop around the corner, but they just sell the left overs from the big stores.

Thanks in advance for any comments.

 

[Vaheed Akhtar]

Sorry, I forgot to mention the last idea.

Sign up to 'just-eat': there's allot of benefits from signing up to these guys. Not only does it save on annual costs of leaflets, posters and advertising - it also targets a wider audience for little cost. The only downside of this is, most of the businesses on there a take-aways, who, essentially, operate on an evening and target a 'tea-time audience'. I fear this will shorten the number of visitors dramatically. Also, it will take at least 5-6 sandwiches to make the trip worth my while: just looking at household deliveries, as we only do workplaces deliveries at the present moment, how many of them can or will order that much food- just to get a delivery?

 

[JimRay]

Why don't you trial the mobile shop idea to see if it's worth investment in the van and staff.

So pick one or two companies, do some cheap flyers (even homemade) in advance, to show what you'll be selling, how much and when you'll start coming round and what time in the morning.

Then just stack your usual car up if you have one. A few wicker baskets, nicely presented and see how it goes..?

 

[Anna Chandley]

Do you supply platters of sandwiches etc for business lunches/meetings?

 

[rickyhyde89]

Hi,

Something I have thought about doing is selling sandwiches to the indipendantly owned corner shops, post offices ect...

The only down side to this is that you will need a refridgiated van which are expensive.

 

[Vaheed Akhtar]

Hi,

Thanks for your replies. Jim: That's a neat idea - I think I'll give that a go. It might even be possible that I can get away with buying a small refrigerated commercial vehicle for a c£2000 - rather than pay £7000+ for a proper mobile shop. Here's a question for you - Whenever I go to building sites, big units/factories - it's hard to communicate with everyone in the building. So, do you think it would be a good idea to have a load of posters done and have them attached somewhere (with permission, of course) to say that I would visit that site everyday between x and x?

There is a little bit of competition - a little van, which arrived on the scene last year, has been trying to nick business from various offices which I do deliveries too. So, do I play ball and get one back over them - or keep clear of any confrontations? I know I don't need any particular licence to trade in this manor, so as long as the actual businesses don't mind me being there.

Anna: Yes, we do. I find buffets are very few and far between nowadays and, if I'm honest, as good as the margins in them are, I rather do without. They're more hassle than they're worth at times.

Ricky: I WOULD try this if it wasn't for the fact that a very good family friend of ours already covers the area with a similar business. I'm a businessman, but wouldn't upset my own moral code of conduct in order to become successful. Besides, from what he says half of the time, it's more trouble than it's worth.

 

[alfie]

as we only do workplaces deliveries at the present momen

For the shop as well as delivery to your existing commercial customers I would suggest simply extending your line to include cup cakes. No other baking of various other types of cake, but simply focus on cup cakes with their high margin and simple manufacturing process at your premises.

Cup Cakes go with sandwiches like milk goes with tea Time to have mine now .

 

[TelesMedia]

Hi,
Have you got an app for your business, whereby customers can view menu's, locate you, like you on facebook, reserve food etc etc.

We can make you an app for £100 + £9.99 per month.

Email me if interested [email protected]

 

[Vaheed Akhtar]

Hi,
Have you got an app for your business, whereby customers can view menu's, locate you, like you on facebook, reserve food etc etc.

We can make you an app for £100 + £9.99 per month.

Email me if interested [email protected]

Can you program it to work with a printer, so all orders are a) paid for before they get to the shop and b) are then printed for us to get them ready in time?

If I'm honest, It's something I've thought about, but I don't think we have a wide enough audience to make it worth our while.

 

[TelesMedia]

Hi Vaheed,

Yes we can set it up so your customers can purchase through the app although this will cost a bit more for us to do. Printing orders, not sure but again can look into this.

One of the most powerful things about the apps is the ability for customers to click on your fanpage and "like" your business. Im guessing most of their "friends" will also be local to your businesses.

Have you got a website that i could look at to gather the info ?

 

[Vaheed Akhtar]

Hi Vaheed,

Yes we can set it up so your customers can purchase through the app although this will cost a bit more for us to do. Printing orders, not sure but again can look into this.

One of the most powerful things about the apps is the ability for customers to click on your fanpage and "like" your business. Im guessing most of their "friends" will also be local to your businesses.

Have you got a website that i could look at to gather the info ?

I haven't a website just yet I'm afraid. I'm trying to find time to set my own web server up from where I can host my own website. Once this is done - i'll get a website up too.

 

[TelesMedia]

Hi Vaheed,

We can do the site hosting and design for you as well. Take a look at ours www.telesmedia.co.uk. We can make it same quality as this. If you go for a website and app plus hosting we can do you a good price.

I look forward to hearing from you. My email address is [email protected]

Anthony