I need business ideas...

[Sum Dum Gai]

Maybe I've been going about this backward. Let's try a new question.

The demographics of our town are as follows:
Population 47,218
Median Age 30.7
Median HH Income $76,371
Per Capita Income $25,567
Average HH Income $88,869
Total Households 13,451
Average Household Size 3.49
Owner Occupied Housing 65.2%
Renter Occupied Housing 29.9%
Vacant Housing Units 4.9%
Employed 84.1%
Unemployed 15.9%

Notice the large household size and decent average income. A frequently heard complaint is that there's nothing to do. We're a pretty boring bedroom type community where most everyone commutes into silicon valley, or works on the farms in the area. Childrens sports are huge here, and it seems like just about everyone under the age of 12 plays at least one sport. Most kids stop playing by 12 however, and everyone whines about the lack of activities for teens. There's also nothing for local twenty somethings to do. If you want nightlife you drive somewhere else to find it. Seriously, just about every business in town is closed by 8pm, even on Fridays and Saturdays, and the small handful that stay open later don't do so by much. We have some stuff in town, but it's mostly restaurants and bars. There are a few little clothing boutiques and shops downtown, but half the buildings there are for lease right now, and the city is working on a revitalize downtown type effort.

So, what type of business do you think a town like this needs? Do kids and families everywhere whine about how there's nothing to do, or is there really nothing to do in an area with this many families who all make decent money? Should we focus on that niche, or go after the bored young professionals? A note on that though, I'm not so sure there are many. I think most of the young professionals just move to San Jose, that's where the jobs are anyway. They don't move out here until they realize they don't make enough to afford a house in a decent school district up there, then they buy a slice of the boring suburban dream in Hollister.

Oh, we'll say I can easily access $65k in cash to start a business, another $35k that would be a much bigger fight, I have excellent credit (but no idea what my current limits are on the credit cards), and no equity in the house. My wife could work the business full time, while I helped out as much as possible while keeping my regular full time job, which more than covers our needs.

[Deleted]

I would stay away from ideas that cater exclusively to teens. They have limited resources and short attention spans. Laser tag was all the rage for a few minutes and then the lamest thing going. I wouldn't want to stake my financial future on the whims of a teenager.

As far as the young professionals, probably not enough of a market. They may need a local coffee shop or gym or cafe, but they are always going to leave town for nightlife. In a town of 45,000 people minus kids minus seniors minus married people, you have about 3 dozen single professionals (jaded singleton math). They have probably already slept with everyone local they were remotely interested in - you need to leave town for a club with some fresh blood.

[Deleted]

Also, I would look at industry data as well as demographic/consumer data.

The Economic Census is a good place to start. (census.gov has all kinds of fun stuff)

Since you mentioned a bowling alley in a previous message (NAICS code 71395)...

There were 4,564 bowling centers in the U.S. operated by 3,880 firms (so, not a whole lot of chains). Annual revenue/receipts seem to typically be in the range of $250,000 - $500,000. You'd have to decide if that was worth it to you once you factor in staffing and operations costs.

You can also look at the 2002 Economic Census to see how things are trending over time.

[Sum Dum Gai]

They have probably already slept with everyone local they were remotely interested in - you need to leave town for a club with some fresh blood.

LMFAO!!! See, you totally get it. So we have teenagers that are too damn wishy washy, the jaded young adults that aren't spending any more time in this sleepy shit hole than they have to, and that leaves middle age parents and their younger kids who haven't turned into wishy washy teens or jaded adults yet. Oh, and the retired folks. The ones with money all live in the golf course community and spend their money at the country club. The poor ones can barely afford cat food and their property taxes, so I'm not sure how viable they are as customers.

[cronewitch]

Start a business to hire teens and retired people.

A daycare center can use employees of almost any age. Set up a kid delivery service to take the under 16 kids to places like soccer practice so parents who work can drop them at daycare in the morning and have them delivered to the house at dinner time.

Another nice suburban business is housekeeping teams, you market the service and hire the cleaning people. The cleaning people spend a few hours in each home each week so those with long commutes don't need to clean as much.

A home meal delivery service or pick up service. You don't cook but might provide cooks who work for the homeowner in their home. Your employees would pick up food and bring it from restaurants for people who want take out but don't want to go get it.

I would cater to the homeowner who works long hours while trying to raise kids too young to drive.

A tutoring and after school place for kids too big for daycare and too young to stay home alone for very long hours. They could read, watch TV, do homework, play games or use parent provided computers. You could hire retired people to take care of them or tutor. You could offer classes they might like to keep them occupied like computer classes to teach them Word or other programs, crafts, etc

[shanendoah]

I'd actually go with a pizza place (or similar family/teen friendly restaurant) that stays open until 10pm Sun, Mon, Wed, Thurs and until midnight Fri & Sat. Be closed on Tuesday to do the cleaning the kitchen needs and restock. You can be open for lunch, too, if you're near enough a high school, but since most adults are commuting, you don't need to be.
You could switch Tuesday closed for Monday closed, but I would keep Wednesday because in the smaller town I grew up in, that was youth group/church activity night and parents often needed something easy to do for dinner, or you'd want to be open for them to have little events at your place.
See about getting a small but decent arcade and a good juke box.
You could have a banquet/event room as well.

This would most likely require you find a building that already has a commercial kitchen and then just need to install the pizza ovens, and you'd need to spend money on a good head chef, but Loop could run the business side of things.
You could also employ teenagers and retired folk.

[Waffle]

Liquor store. Doesn't address the nothing to do problem (and yes they say that in my very small town also). But, there are 3 very successful liquor stores within about 5 miles all owned by the same group of local millionaires.

Or is CA one of those states, where the government runs the liquor stores?

[Peace Of Mind]

I agree with Shanen. A pizza/sub/munchi place with cheap delicious food with maybe a room for a pool table or two in a side room that could double as a cigar bar or something that would appeal to adults. A place to hit both age groups.

ETA: But you'd need a liquor license for Beer and Wine which would be the real money maker and those are expensive here!

[Deleted]

I would not open a restaurant of any kind. They are notoriously low margin, lots of hours and prone to short lives.

[Deleted]

How about a small entertainment complex like "Boomers" here in San Diego.. Mini golf, go carts, etc.

[Sum Dum Gai]

bowling alley

Smartass!

I'd actually go with a pizza place (or similar family/teen friendly restaurant) that stays open until 10pm Sun, Mon, Wed, Thurs and until midnight Fri & Sat.

Now I know why we have so many non chain pizza places. Almost every restuarant in town is either mexican food or a local pizza place. None of them stay open all that late though, at least that I'm aware of.

[❤ mollymouser ❤]

Is there a movie theater in Hollister?

[Sum Dum Gai]

Yeah we have a movie theater.

I was serious with the bowling alley

I already have a thread about that. I'm trying to find something that won't need 2 million in start up money.

[phil5185]

I go ice skating with the grandkids fairly often - the ice (two hockey sheets) is nearly always fully utilized. The minivans line up at the curb and unload groups of 3, 4, 5 kids. As you watch hundreds of them skate by you can say $7, $7, $7, and so on. Actually, probably way more - skate rental is $3, they have video games, pizza, hot chocolate. Maybe $10 or $15 a head?

And I've heard that Public Skate is not the money maker - it is the ice "sheet rental". The figure skaters rent a square of ice for practice/lessons - that goes on into the wee hours, sometimes 4:00AM. And there is hockey 'sheet time" for each league - peewee, jr, middle school, senior, adult, etc. And 'stick time' where players rent the ice for hockey practice/lessons.

[illinicheme]

I've always wanted to start a bar like one in the town where I went to grad school. Fantastic place to hang out. Good fancy beer, good beer "drinks" (Belgian whites mixed with syrup, etc.), 25 cent for a bowl of unlimited popcorn from a machine in the corner, a million board games to choose from, and decent music not played so loud that you can't talk. And pool and darts. (The popcorn especially was genius - something a little salty to snack equals many more beers consumed.)

No idea what the margins on a place like that is though. And you might have to do a combo bar/daycare in order to get anyone to go.

[illinicheme]

I'd love it if someone would open an ice rink close to us. We have a nice one available, but it's 30 miles north. Boo.

[IPAfan]

It's not glamorous, but a coffee stand can be a decent business with very low startup costs. You can make the process routine and run several. Hire college students at $8/hr + tips to run the stand (while they study on the down time). You could even start a model coffee stand and then franchise them and finance the startup cost. Invest in some relatively cheap equipment to roast your own coffee and voila, you've got a unique business with a competitive advantage (your own fresh roasted coffee).

The business idea is not to have a coffee stand, but to start selling the business idea to lots and lots of people. You'll have a prepackaged business that's ready to go, and can be run by anyone with 2 brain cells. The incremental costs are low so you can grow the business with cashflow instead of coming up with $2 million up front.

I'd rather start a coffee stand franchise (or smoothie stand, or even some type of food stand) than a bowling alley any day. If your location doesn't work or the business goes sour, you can probably recoup a lot of your investment by either: 1) moving; or 2) selling your equipment to someone else.

Create a whole system... An employees manual with standardized processes for making drinks and preparing high margin foods, a process for getting licenses, centrally managed payroll, etc. A process for building "guerilla marketing" campaigns. The first stand may take 6 months to a year just to get the process down.

The more I talk about this the more I wish I had the time to devote to putting it together myself.

[Sum Dum Gai]

I go ice skating with the grandkids fairly often - the ice (two hockey sheets) is nearly always fully utilized. The minivans line up at the curb and unload groups of 3, 4, 5 kids. As you watch hundreds of them skate by you can say $7, $7, $7, and so on. Actually, probably way more - skate rental is $3, they have video games, pizza, hot chocolate. Maybe $10 or $15 a head?

That's an idea. We currently have to drive to all the way into San Jose to go ice skating. There are at least six places in the bay area but the one closest to us is in Campbell. So if we opened one here that would give us Hollister (50k population), Prunedale (20k), Salinas (150k), and probably Gilroy (50k); not to mention all the people living in unincorporated areas between here and there which is probably another 50k or so. Has anyone ever seen a place that does ice skating and roller skating out of the same location? We don't have a roller rink either, and I know the local Derby team is looking for a place to practice and host games.

I think we're looking at expensive start up costs again though.

[Sum Dum Gai]

You could even start a model coffee stand and then franchise them and finance the startup cost. Invest in some relatively cheap equipment to roast your own coffee and voila, you've got a unique business with a competitive advantage (your own fresh roasted coffee).

Maybe I'm just not busy savvy enough to recognize the genius of this plan, but aren't you basically ripping off Starbucks, Petes, and dozens of other businesses here? Not saying it can't work or anything, it obviously does since you have dozens of company's doing this, but you're also competing against dozens of national and regional brands that are all better known than you are.

[AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP]

Billards / Pool Hall?

[IPAfan]

First, I think you'd be competing more against Dutch Brothers. We're talking low capital coffee stands rather than location coffee shops. Second, the nice thing about a coffee stand is that it requires very little capital to start, but with the right location can produce excellent returns. Third, can you differentiate yourself from the competition? Many, many coffee drinkers would prefer to buy from a small local franchise.

Starbucks is an excellent business that earns terrific returns on its capital. It has a strong competitive advantage because of its huge presence. The point though, is that if you can earn a strong return on capital you can expand the business, or even franchise it and have others do the work of expanding it for you.

McDonalds is one of the best businesses in the world. It has nothing to do with the hamburgers or fries (which suck) but due to the fact that it's very well thought out and turned into an excellent system. A system that anyone can run, but one that must be paid for. More importantly, all the ingredients have to be purchased from corporate McDonalds.

The brilliance of the coffee stand franchise business is that eventually you get to the point where the vast majority of the capital costs are born by the individual franchisee's while the franchiser focuses on the business which provides the highest return on invested capital. So for instance selling the franchise, coffee, pastry, etc. to the individual franchisees.

Before you can get there you need to have a business that makes sense for the franchisee. A business will make the most sense if you can earn a high rate of return on invested capital.

Your bowling alley idea is interesting, but would be tough to earn a good ROIC. A $2 million investment would mean you'd need to be making $600,000 to make a 30% ROIC. Whereas a coffee stand with a $35,000-$50,000 startup cost could definitely earn $15,000 annually AFTER paying for selling, general, administrative, and cost of goods sold. The problem is trying to run all those coffee shops, and that's where the franchise idea comes into play. You just need to create a coffee stand that can be completely systematic, and earn $15,000 a year in profit after paying minimum wage for employment.

Then all you've gotta do is start hiring employees. Find the good employees and offer them a franchise. Owner finance the franchise at a few percent over your business's own borrowing costs and then sell your trademarked coffee, pastries, smoothies, ice cream, or whatever.

The fact that starbucks has been a raging success is a GOOD THING. It shows that this is an attractive business. There's a reason that there are no multi-billion dollar bowling alleys, and the most successful restaurant in the world has the worst food (McDonalds). JMHO

[Deleted]

Tart frozen yogurt shops - pinkberry knock offs - seem to be sprouting up here. Since you don't have a hard winter where you are, you wouldn't have seasonal downtimes. Pretty family friendly, and they get a lot of my money.

(It feels trendy, so you may want to plan on getting out of the business and into something else in 5-8 years or so, but not quite coldstone/overpriced/gone in 2 years trendy)

[skubikky]

www.playitagainsports.com/

Take a look at this.... Located in Webster, NY (outside of Rochester)

[doxieluvr]

No one has mentioned the business i want to start. I would like to open a bingo hall.

[constanz22]

Are either of you "animal" people? It wouldn't solve the "nothing to do" problem, but, what about pet boarding? You could start something like that in your home, depending on how it's set up, and expand as needed. Personally, this is a dream of mine. I would cater to small dog owners, because nothing like that exists in my area. All of the boarding facilities are geared to large dogs, very cold, not at all "homey". There are tons of small dog owners, like me, who treat their animals like their children and will not leave them in that type of environment. I have lots of ideas how it'd be set up and run...
An ice cream shop might be fun, but I agree with others that a restaurant is a bad idea. Restaurants are THE most failed small business out there. It is long, long hours too.

[Colleenz]

Have you thought about a Pump it Up franchise? Your liquidity is about there - not sure of your net worth.

[qofcc]

www.playitagainsports.com/

Take a look at this.... Located in Webster, NY (outside of Rochester)

I've been to one of their other locations... it smells like dirty gym socks

I actually like Crone's idea of after school care, but I'd do it differently. When my DD was young, she went to a before-and-after school program that was known for doing a lot of fun things. They mostly hired college students as employees (we have a lot of colleges nearby and a lot of people going to school for early childhood development). They also did a full-time program in the summer for ages 6-12. After a while, the business grew to the point where the woman's husband quit his job to help her expand the business and now they offer a full range of daycare services. My DG goes there and it's awesome. The area for the older kids has a big screen TV, pinball machines, fooseball table, games & toys, etc. They serve snacks and there's an incredible playground outside. They do fun activities and parties on the school holidays where parents traditionally have to work (teacher conference days, president's day, etc.).

You could also expand on that idea to offer an after school membership club for the 12+ crowd for minimally supervised entertainment, marketing to the siblings of the younger crowd.

The nice thing about daycare catering to the 6-12 crowd is the high staff-to-student ratios make it much more profitable than infant daycare and it's not a 12 hour/day commitment.

[midjd]

I think Beerfan has a really profitable idea with the pre-packaged franchises... not even coffee, necessarily, but just something that is fairly portable and can be easily reproduced. It seems that the weather is on your side out there - so it wouldn't even need to be in an enclosed building.

[maui1]

here you go......

most restaurants work with some type of micos system, that has the waiters inputting info into a computer after they record it by hand on a note pad, and everything after that is done by hand.

the idea is.......get apple to create an app for a restaurant to input their menus and then pay for all the waiters i-phones and plans, and then bypass the whole micos process. (benefit to all employees, as after work they have a i-phone at no cost to them)

the waiter would then note the order directly on their i-phone, the order would show up in the kitchen as a picture on a monitor, the order would then be filled, noted on the monitor, causing a phone message that the order is ready, then when the order is delivered, the order is closed, recording the event, tallying a bill, and allowing for e-payment.

get apple to pay for the idea........just think of all the restaurants around the world that could use the idea, and how many users would be gained by apple.

[Wisconsin Beth]

Jun 16, 2011 22:57:15 GMT -5 @illinicheme said:

I'd love it if someone would open an ice rink close to us. We have a nice one available, but it's 30 miles north. Boo.

We have the Pettit National Ice Center here. I don't think they've been in the black in years. Every so often there's an article in the paper about their financials.