Well, for most people a dream café is a dream that doesn’t really come to reality EVER, cause Life happens, either time, age, money, or responsibilities come in way.
But for the rest, a dream café is a HUGE thing. Its sometimes, months, years or even decades in the making.
I have worked as a Full Time Independent professional Coffee Consultant for now around 5 years, but in total have about 17 years plus experience in Hospitality sector. Let me tell you hospitality is a very demanding, challenging and almost an undervalued industry.
In the initial stage of my career I was working in hotels and then towards coffee, but more importantly in the earlier part of my career I was lucky to work in business where I could take discussions at the company’s cost and learn a lot through mistakes, which later on helped me to work with my clients (now) who invest a lot of the their savings into projects and I am as cautious as I could be to reduce the risks.
Having worked for some time and having seen so many people in the industry, with businesses that did well, that didn’t do well, those are going by and some struggling, there were a few things I thought I could share.
(I am in no means an EXPERT or Magician) but these are my personal opinions and as basis of my overall suggestions.
So here it is 5 Steps towards opening your dream café.
1. Define your Needs.
You are the only one who knows “exactly” what you want. Others will only know how much and how you explain it to them. Since the idea incepted in your head, try to define your needs as much as possible. Write it down, read it over a few days, and then re write it, and re do these steps over and over again, until the idea/your need on paper becomes clear, crisp, and Simple. Making anything simple requires a lot of work put in.
Like let’s say your idea was to open a café that’s cozy, looks really cute, serves really nice drinks and good food, not sure of what style. It would be the “the place to be” for the localities, serving coffees and offering choices for people to choose from and etc. etc. . This was the first draft, which might convert into:
“A neighborhood chill café, serving a wide range of food and coffee options, not too loud, dim lights and cozy feel.”
2. Research – Do not Over Research
Research is good, but like they say, anything in excess is not really good. Research is good, cause you want to know a bit of the unknown. Challenge is with an industry like F&B and with a niche like Coffee, once you start scratching the surface, its very easy to dive into the spiral rabbit hole, that is never ending.
Just like that mild seasonal flu google search turns into a life-threatening disease.
Research on things about the industry, the practices, pay structure, machinery, equipment, options, short comings, gaps, opportunity and so on, cause in the end you are building a business, that means there’s a potential problem that you are solving by creating your business (Café)
3. Visualize
A picture is worth a thousand words, is especially true when you are doing your research, market study, planning the idea for the space and sharing your idea. In this modern world of apps for everything there are many apps that you can use to do this part of your study. If you like something search, take a pic, save it. Over time you will have a good collection of things that you would want to have in your café, could be the style of lights, shape of the glassware or cups, bar structure, color scheme, uniform and so on…. to take inspiration. It also becomes very easy to share the visual aids with people who might be a part of the project to explain with ease and quick.
But yes, DO NOT COPY left right center, cause people are smart, and people will know.
4. Financial Planning
People who work on their dream project often get too carried away and romanticize the café set up that they forget it’s actually a Business.
It’s very important to treat your dream project like your business too, because it needs to be sustainable financially too for it to run in long run and make you good return. (Unless that is not something you intend to do). Even if profit is not your major need, running a good business is essential, to be aware where the money is going in and where it’s going,
Also, good to know what the essential expenses are to be included in capital expenses.
For e.g., a good tip is to have a minimum of 6 months’ worth of your operating expenses as part of your capital expenditure, its ultra-level important to do that.
5. Hire Expert’s Help.
A Consultant in this article (a café or coffee consultant), is supposed to be a partner with you in your project. Hiring the right consultant is crucial, but once you are through the selection process of the expert. He/she/they would be able to help you so much, there will be so many mistakes that you might make, which a good consultant would have made in their pasts. A good expert consultant would be able to save a lot of your time, resources, tension, and Money
Select a consultant, not just based on their fees, but someone who is honest, work oriented, and passionately dedicated. When you hire someone, the automation should be simple that the common goal is the make a good business to stand on its feet. The vibe is very important when selecting the right person, who can not only be honest and straightforward but also welcomes debates and discussion because there will be some disagreements.
There is a 6th rule, which is kind of the most important rule, have fun on this journey, cause isn’t that this all about to something that you would like, cherish and love to do day in and day out.
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