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I have a friend that has a brick oven Pizza place in Delaware and he says those sign wavers are by far the best form of advertising he does.
If the main thing you are purchasing is the equipment then I guess I don't understand why you are bothering with this place at all. Used restaurant equipment is readily available and at bargain prices. Why not get the equipment that you need for the type of food you ultimately want to serve, a better location without lease restrictions and without all of the franchising concerns?
Good post. The good part about all those failed restaurants is that they sell their equipment cheap
Why is it over the top? Sure, he can be successful with this, but odds are he won't be.
The odds change based on the people involved. I know Glumpy can cook and I know he is a cautious person who will look at all angles. I don't know his wife but I take his word for her experience. I think his chances are much better than people who eat at restaurants and then think they can run one.
Of course the odds change, but they are still poor. No idea if he can cook, but it seems irrelevant since he said he's keeping his day job.
I know how the business works. I have spent way too many years in it. I think "don't do it" with no context isn't helpful or even really pertinent.
I'm guessing you've never owned one (just like the OP), and working in the industry is far different from owning. Let's not act as if Glumpy and/or his wife have vastly more experience than most restaurant owners. You really don't need more context than that to know that it's unlikely to become successful. Reading the details makes me think it's even less likely to do so.
Really want to re-emphasize the quality of food mention above. If you properly price point and your food is significantly better than Domino's this can work. If you don't hit both of those marks you'll be sale chasing, which will make it much more difficult to be profitable. Customers are likely to return even if the service is sub par at times if the food is great.
I would consider a "Hot-n-Ready" Pizza place to be more of a fast-food concept than a traditional restaurant, for what it's worth.
Yeah all I have done is manage them. I mean what do I know? I have only run several successful restaurants while owners were thousands of miles away. In fact since every restaurant is doomed to fail no one should open one, ever.
I'm sure you have, but you still haven't acknowledged that "running" a business is very different from owning one. Of course, I said nothing remotely close to your last sentence, but that's par for the course with you.
I partnered with a guy that opened 18 Boston Markets in CA, was district manager for Coco's chain, consulted for an LA based company on his ten restaurants, and had run the kitchen at several places. But when it came to owning his own place, he was a disaster and I had to bail him out of it, costing me a ton.
Besides my previous post when I was being a ####... this is pretty sound advice. Get the numbers straight and be honest with yourself about where you draw your profitability line. You may be in the red for a little bit, but know your break point.
I'm looking at this as well. The deal for the equipment is actually a good one, but I'm not so sure that belt style oven isn't a more limiting factor than what we need. The question of the non-franchise is a bugger, the lease arrangement for the benefit of that location an open question. The existing traffic flow is a real plus but that's not our only target market.
This reminds me of one of my favorite BBQ haunts, been around for as long as I remember, so remote that they had to name the road after the restaurant just so folks could find it without getting lost! What we want to do I think is not so dependent on location--other than being accessible.
A lot of it could be delivery and fairly large scale. We are already embedded in that latin market and have on occasion provided for such potluck events.
It seems to be a really good deal compared to what else we've seen on the market but it would still be a pretty heavy debt. It would definitely be cleaner if we were able to invest in this same package piecemeal instead of whole hog.
Nothing packs the house like Mexican soup.glumpy said:Interesting stuff pittstown. While I've got years of restaurant experience the pizza part was short lived with a Pizza Inn years ago--over one winter to complement my concrete construction income. I did not have trouble with the oven; this one does have a conveyor belt, and the wings are good--but what you say about that effect on pies gives me pause. Historically I go for more of a hand formed designer pizza. Obviously I've posted that it's the deal and location which we're primarily attracted to here.
I had thought there were no other pizza joints on this strip and just learned that there is indeed one a mile away--a Dominos also just out of sight of the main drag.
Fennis--I like it! Was thinking of Glumpy's Pizza & Posole
Thanks Fennis but I think we've pretty much decided to go another direction. Bottom line was that we would be taking on a 3 year $100,000 commitment between purchase and lease before groceries, and that's just more than I want to start out with no matter how appealing the deal. We're starting to look at other options.Nothing packs the house like Mexican soup.glumpy said:Interesting stuff pittstown. While I've got years of restaurant experience the pizza part was short lived with a Pizza Inn years ago--over one winter to complement my concrete construction income. I did not have trouble with the oven; this one does have a conveyor belt, and the wings are good--but what you say about that effect on pies gives me pause. Historically I go for more of a hand formed designer pizza. Obviously I've posted that it's the deal and location which we're primarily attracted to here.
I had thought there were no other pizza joints on this strip and just learned that there is indeed one a mile away--a Dominos also just out of sight of the main drag.
Fennis--I like it! Was thinking of Glumpy's Pizza & Posole
In all seriousness, good luck! I am sure you and your wife will make it successful.
Pretty much this if you're only running 1 or 2. You need a pretty large chain of places to feed off of each other to make it.
Very excited for you! Good luck.UPDATE! it's been Crazy!!
Thanks for all the feedback--I pretty much was concerned for the three big issues we touched on:
1. The cost of getting in was really high, especially considering that we would be working around the equipment; it was not what we wanted.
2. The lease would be really high for this area, considering that the benefits were not exclusive to that site. Between the startup costs and lease I figured we would be down at least $1mil before opening the doors.
3. The franchise/not a franchise question. I did not trust the answer to that question, and thanks to Mr Roboto for pretty well summing up and confirming all those related concerns.
So...the light of my life was pretty dark. Actually--she was furious. I tried not to give any false sense of optimism but the fact that we were still looking at it after months of that I thought was just due diligence she took pretty hard. A couple weeks later she had word from a friend about this place we might want to look at so despite my lack of enthusiasm off we went for a Sunday drive. Not so good, so we kept looking....
We stopped by one store, where a friend of hers was in the process of opening a convenience store and offered to lease a connected space, a nondescript storefront,---used to be a bar years ago, which she thought we could build into a kitchen. Well, I knew within one minute there was no way in hell we'd be able to make that happen but spent a couple hours looking for an out. The location was actually a great one--but the building is derelict, and that's the only thing it's got going for it.
I finally stepped outside and looked at the stores across the highway, and all the traffic flowing by--and had to make a call: "Honey, there's no way in Hell we can make a kitchen out of that space." It was likt a train barely clinging to the track. "...but I sure could park one out front right here--" BAM!
So to jump forward to where we're at:
We settled on a sublease, and I placed a deposit down on the spot. The location is indeed a great one and glad I did--because since then the folks have had everyone and their brother trying to get in on it, some in some pretty ugly ways. Weare working more as a partnership though because we are providing services as well for that lease.
We bought a trailer. I would have preferred to pick up a truck but the deal was incredible, timing right, and the way it's set up really perfect for what we need. We have not yet had the official health inspection because first we need to attach to a commissary--but the inspector was real impressed when he looked at it.
Before hooking up with the commissary we had to take ServSafe classes, and go through other required steps--we may be in the toughest county for these operations, and with the proliferation of mobile kitchens recently they are really tight on their requirements. We're about halfway there. It just so happens there's a nonprofit set up one mile from where we intend to plant the trailer and they have allowed us to pushthings since we're already so committed.
I've got a bead on a brick and mortar site when this takes off; in the meantime we pretty much intend to run this as such, and only travel with it on occasion. We've thrown a couple of introductory events using other commercial kitchens while developing our menu and the response has been fantastic, with a few signed on for future events.
The best part is that it's paid up to date. That won't go on too much longer but it's awfully nice not to begin under such a mountain of debt. While getting into the project I talked with my financial advisor and decided to pull it from retirement. Gawd knows I wasn't going to be able to retire on that amount anyway--and this might make it possible!
That's the outline--much more between the lines but I'm being paged. Thanks for all the support and suggestions!
Food trucks are the rage right now and North Carolina is a hotspot for them. Best of luck, GB.UPDATE! it's been Crazy!!
Thanks for all the feedback--I pretty much was concerned for the three big issues we touched on:
1. The cost of getting in was really high, especially considering that we would be working around the equipment; it was not what we wanted.
2. The lease would be really high for this area, considering that the benefits were not exclusive to that site. Between the startup costs and lease I figured we would be down at least $1mil before opening the doors.
3. The franchise/not a franchise question. I did not trust the answer to that question, and thanks to Mr Roboto for pretty well summing up and confirming all those related concerns.
So...the light of my life was pretty dark. Actually--she was furious. I tried not to give any false sense of optimism but the fact that we were still looking at it after months of that I thought was just due diligence she took pretty hard. A couple weeks later she had word from a friend about this place we might want to look at so despite my lack of enthusiasm off we went for a Sunday drive. Not so good, so we kept looking....
We stopped by one store, where a friend of hers was in the process of opening a convenience store and offered to lease a connected space, a nondescript storefront,---used to be a bar years ago, which she thought we could build into a kitchen. Well, I knew within one minute there was no way in hell we'd be able to make that happen but spent a couple hours looking for an out. The location was actually a great one--but the building is derelict, and that's the only thing it's got going for it.
I finally stepped outside and looked at the stores across the highway, and all the traffic flowing by--and had to make a call: "Honey, there's no way in Hell we can make a kitchen out of that space." It was likt a train barely clinging to the track. "...but I sure could park one out front right here--" BAM!
So to jump forward to where we're at:
We settled on a sublease, and I placed a deposit down on the spot. The location is indeed a great one and glad I did--because since then the folks have had everyone and their brother trying to get in on it, some in some pretty ugly ways. Weare working more as a partnership though because we are providing services as well for that lease.
We bought a trailer. I would have preferred to pick up a truck but the deal was incredible, timing right, and the way it's set up really perfect for what we need. We have not yet had the official health inspection because first we need to attach to a commissary--but the inspector was real impressed when he looked at it.
Before hooking up with the commissary we had to take ServSafe classes, and go through other required steps--we may be in the toughest county for these operations, and with the proliferation of mobile kitchens recently they are really tight on their requirements. We're about halfway there. It just so happens there's a nonprofit set up one mile from where we intend to plant the trailer and they have allowed us to pushthings since we're already so committed.
I've got a bead on a brick and mortar site when this takes off; in the meantime we pretty much intend to run this as such, and only travel with it on occasion. We've thrown a couple of introductory events using other commercial kitchens while developing our menu and the response has been fantastic, with a few signed on for future events.
The best part is that it's paid up to date. That won't go on too much longer but it's awfully nice not to begin under such a mountain of debt. While getting into the project I talked with my financial advisor and decided to pull it from retirement. Gawd knows I wasn't going to be able to retire on that amount anyway--and this might make it possible!
That's the outline--much more between the lines but I'm being paged. Thanks for all the support and suggestions!
There's an old old truckstop off I-85--I'd guess it's been 30 years since it's been active. I remember eating at the diner there on the way to the chain races at the old dirt track--food was great but then we might not have been all that critical at the time. That's the place--basically three buildings and this is the one fronting the road. A lot of commercial development facing it across the street but before anyone can build on it I understand that they will have to widen the bridge over I-85 and that cost is prohibitive so far.
what could possibly go wrong?
