Karen
I echo what Ron said 100% on the Grand Opening. We opened soft on July 1st
and are building up to a Grand in the latter part of September. I hope we
will be ready :) A July 1st Grand would have been a disaster for us not only
for all the very valid reasons Ron mentioned but you also really need to
have your shingle out there and be familiar to your local environs I think
before you try to pack them in. Nothing could be more depressing than a
Grand Opening where staff outnumbers customers and I'm afraid unless you are
prepared to spend huge amounts on advertising and promotion that would be
the case.
The coffeehouse, cafe aspect of your business totally depends on location
and the demographics of your prospective clientele I think. Ron's cafe is
downtown and I believe could totally sustain itself in the manner he
describes. We are suburban however and very close to a lot of the airport
hotels. Most cybercafe owners are travellers I think and you know how hard
it is to get a good cup of 'joe' in those hotels. So we double as an
Espresso Bar, very light on food items (only pastries and the like) but
offering gourmet blend coffee and all the cool espresso based drinks. That
works for us in this environment. At this early stage roughly half our
revenue is coming from the cafe side and the rest from computers (11
stations).The margins on specialty coffee are extremely good and will add
nicely to your numbers.
Anything you invest in coffee equipment will likely turn out to be a good
investment for you if you promote that side of your business as well as the
computers.
We at 'The Bean' wish you the very best of luck with your new enerprise!
Rick Glendinning
The Virtual Coffee Bean
Richmond, BC, Canada
www.virtualcoffeebean.com
PS - As Ron also mentioned this is one opinion and one experience only.
Gather all the info you can and then try to decide how it applies to your
situation.
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of from skyblu
> > Sent: August 27, 2000 10:30 AM
> > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > Subject: [cc] grand opening ideas
> >
> >
> > Hello Again,
> >
> > I have been replying to emails,and have never introduced myself
> > and let you
> > know about my cafe.
> >
> > My name is Karen, my family and I are opening our store in North
> > Carolina,
> > USA.
> >
> > Our store is 2250sf. We will have 20 networked computers, 6 arcade
games
> > and 1 pool table. We went with Windows 98SE on the workstations and
will
> > have linux on the server. I know we will have to download a
> > million patches
> > for the games, but from all that I know and have read and heard about,
it
> > beats WindowsNT hands down.
> >
> > Our grand opening/ribbon cutting is September 29th. I am not
> > sure what type
> > of door prizes to give out so if anyone has any good idea, please
> > post them
> > to the list so we can all take advantage. I am trying to stay
> > away from all
> > computer related items as some people may not have a computer and that
is
> > why they are at our store.
> >
> > We are not going to sell cooked food, just lots of snacks, and
> > prepackaged
> > sandwiches as our store is adjacent to a deli. I would like to sell some
> > speciality coffees, but the machines are too expensive for us
> > right now, so
> > we will only offer coffee from a regular coffee pot.
> >
> > I would love to hear how some of you started, where and how you find
your
> > software. Right now we are planning on just buying a copy of
> > each game we
> > want for 8-10 computers and only offer it to that amount of
> > customers at a
> > time. First come, first served.
> >
> > Do any of you offer tournaments? We are planning tournaments and
> > lock ins
> > so if you are experienced send some advice.
> >
> > We are leaning toward the cybertime software program to monitor the
> > computer, but are also working on an inside program we are
> > developing. The
> > software is a BIG expense for a startup, so we may have to pass
> > on it for a
> > few month! I am not sure it works with linux either.
> >
> > Well that's our store and story, would appreciate any tips and tricks
you
> > have learned through the years.
> >
> > Good Luck
> > Karen
> >
> >
> > ________________________________________________________________________
> > Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
> >
> >
> >
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