r/Glasgow Tools

Title
Author	meepmeep13
Comment	Well, there's plenty of successful cafes around, so it's clearly not mad. But some key issues: 1. planning restrictions on the proportion of food-serving places in key areas. You can't just open a cafe anywhere. For example, to open a cafe anywhere near Byres Rd you can only move into a premises already operating as one - this is why the Nardinis had to close, as it was refused permission to use those premises to serve food. 2. you don't make money selling coffee - I don't know exactly, but I believe the margin on a typical cup of take-away coffee is about 10 or 20p, so to have a viable business that can afford a £10k machine and staff to run it you either have to serve a LOT of coffee (think mainstream chains or Tinderbox with continuous service) or make the money on your food. 3. Commercial landlords often don't care if the businesses they host are commercially viable, if they know someone else will take over. So you may find in many places that seem great for a cafe the rent is fundamentally too high to make the business profitable. So basically, cafes are a sensible business if they're in the right place and selling the right stuff, but almost anywhere that is the right place for a viable business with sufficient footfall will already have a cafe in it. So you need to have a business plan and funding set up to be ready to pounce as soon as suitable premises appear, with a clear picture of what rents are going to be viable. The first step is to go along to Business Gateway - they'll help you start to construct a business plan. If you attend one of their (free) workshops it'll also give you an idea of how many people are trying to open cafes!
Reddit Link	https://www.reddit.com/r/glasgow/comments/cxxned/does_anyone_have_experience_of_opening_a_cafe_in/eyoay0q/
Created	Sat 31st Aug 2019 6:42pm
Status	()

Well, there's plenty of successful cafes around, so it's clearly not mad. But some key issues:

1. planning restrictions on the proportion of food-serving places in key areas. You can't just open a cafe anywhere. For example, to open a cafe anywhere near Byres Rd you can only move into a premises already operating as one - this is why the Nardinis had to close, as it was refused permission to use those premises to serve food.

2. you don't make money selling coffee - I don't know exactly, but I believe the margin on a typical cup of take-away coffee is about 10 or 20p, so to have a viable business that can afford a £10k machine and staff to run it you either have to serve a LOT of coffee (think mainstream chains or Tinderbox with continuous service) or make the money on your food.

3. Commercial landlords often don't care if the businesses they host are commercially viable, if they know someone else will take over. So you may find in many places that seem great for a cafe the rent is fundamentally too high to make the business profitable.

So basically, cafes are a sensible business if they're in the right place and selling the right stuff, but almost anywhere that is the right place for a viable business with sufficient footfall will already have a cafe in it. So you need to have a business plan and funding set up to be ready to pounce as soon as suitable premises appear, with a clear picture of what rents are going to be viable.

The first step is to go along to Business Gateway - they'll help you start to construct a business plan. If you attend one of their (free) workshops it'll also give you an idea of how many people are trying to open cafes!